Man1 - gksu.1

gksu - GTK+ frontend for su and sudo

gksu

gksu [/-u <user>/] [/options/] <command>

gksudo [/-u <user>/] [/options/] <command>

This manual page documents briefly gksu and gksudo

gksu is a frontend to su and gksudo is a frontend to sudo. Their primary purpose is to run graphical commands that need root without the need to run an X terminal emulator and using su directly.

Notice that all the magic is done by the underlying library, libgksu. Also notice that the library will decide if it should use su or sudo as backend using the /apps/gksu/sudo-mode gconf key, if you call the gksu command. You can force the backend by using the gksudo command, or by using the –sudo-mode and –su-mode options.

If no command is given, the gksu program will display a small window that allows you to type in a command to be run, and to select what user the program should be run as. The other options are disregarded, right now, in this mode.

–debug, -d

Print information on the screen that might be useful for diagnosing and/or solving problems.

–user <user>, -u <user>

Call <command> as the specified user.

–disable-grab, -g

Disable the “locking” of the keyboard, mouse, and focus done by the program when asking for password.

–prompt, -P

Ask the user if they want to have their keyboard and mouse grabbed before doing so.

–preserve-env, -k

Preserve the current environments, does not set $HOME nor $PATH, for example.

–login, -l

Make this a login shell. Beware this may cause problems with the Xauthority magic. Run xhost to allow the target user to open windows on your display!

–description <description|file>, -D <description|file>

Provide a descriptive name for the command to be used in the default message, making it nicer. You can also provide the absolute path for a .desktop file. The Name key for will be used in this case.

–message <message>, -m <message>

Replace the standard message shown to ask for password for the argument passed to the option. Only use this if –description does not suffice.

–print-pass, -p

Ask gksu to print the password to stdout, just like ssh-askpass. Useful to use in scripts with programs that accept receiving the password on stdin.

–su-mode, -w

Force gksu to use su(1) as its backend for running the programs.

–sudo-mode, -S

Force gksu to use sudo(1) as its backend for running the programs.

*su*(1), *sudo*(1)