Why does quicklisp need "root" privilege? - clisp

The root user can install quicklisp successfully. Howvever the ordinary user cannot.
I do not know why. Could anyone here shed a light on me?

You do not need root privileges in order to use or install Quicklisp.
The “permission denied” error you're getting is a general Unix issue, not a Quicklisp one. It results from you having installed Quicklisp as root. Your ~/quicklisp directory is now owned by root while it ought to be owned by your non-root user account. The simplest solution is to remove the ~/quicklisp directory and start over without using sudo.

sorry did not catch it well with given short message.
I guess with root privilege, one can install the files to /usr or somewhere, while commonly ordinary user are not granted to do.
haven't be using quicklisp, but i guess running it does not require special privilege.

Related

Dynamically get username in Postinst script of .deb package

I wrote Postinst script for changing owner and file permission:
chown -R $(whoami) ~/Desktop/my_file.desktop
chmod 777 ~/Desktop/my_file.desktop
but after installation it does nothing.
I'm really not getting what part of script is wrong. Please tell how to get dynamically username in Postinst script?
Package installation runs as root, unconditionally. There is no concept of an invoking user; indeed, the package installation may happen e.g. before any user accounts exist on the box.
It's extremely unclear what you actually hope to achieve, but it looks like perhaps your package should simply install a script which then performs the task when the user runs it. This will also conveniently create a file which is already owned by the current user, without any chown trickery.
Even if a user exists, there is no guarantee that they have a Desktop directory in their home directory, or that they are currently, or ever, logged in using a GUI.
Finally, whatever you are attempting to do, chmod 777 is wrong and dangerous. You should absolutely not assign write access for everyone, to anything, ever.
(Okay, so there are two or three obscure scenarios related to system administration where this is actually required and useful; otherwise it should probably be technically impossible in the first place.)

node.js read protected files without running as root

I'd like to read/write files using nodejs that live in a protected directory (/etc/apache2/sites-available). I understand that I can run the script with sudo but the idea of that makes me worried. Is there some way I can have node try to elevate for certain functions/calls without having the whole script run with root access?
If you do not provide elevated rights to your script, the script will be unable to mysteriously obtain those rights out of the thin air.
Granted you still need to modify the files, then consider giving write permissinos to your app.
If you are running app as user joe, and owner of sites-available files is root, then do: chown -R joe:joe sites-available.
But if some other user already uses those files, then you might get into permissions conflict. In this case, you can workaround using shared group, or SSH as that user.
Shortly, there are several ways of achieving your goal. But it is completely unrelated to Node.js technology, and all about linux, chown and chmod.

Installing software on Ubuntu as non-root

I've been stuck on a problem for two days now where the software I'm trying to install will not proceed unless I make a separate user which is non-root.
Keep in mind I'm a big linux noob and not very experienced with the OS.
I make a user called "smrtanalysis" in a group called "smrtanalysis".
I put him in the sudoers file.
I made a folder called smrtanalysis in my home/nick/ directory
I downloaded the software from the PacBio website and put the .run files into this directory I noted above.
I used chmod 777 and chown (to user smrtanalysis) on the directory
noted above, and the .run file
I logged into smrtanalysis user by su smrtanalysis, password, and typed
./smrtanalyis-2.2.0.133377.run
the file runs, but then aborts with the following error message:
We recommend running this script as a designated SMRT Analysis user
(e.g. smrtanalysis) who will own all smrtpipe jobs and daemon
processes.
Current user is 'root' (primary group: root)
Installing as 'root' is currently not supported Switch to the desired
user and restart the install. Aborting installation...
Here is the install documentation:
https://github.com/PacificBiosciences/SMRT-Analysis/wiki/SMRT-Analysis-Software-Installation-v2.2.0
It seems pretty straightforward but I can't seem to get it working. If you guys look at the install docs, you'll probably be able to tell me what I'm doing wrong.
Thanks for any help!
Regards,
Nick
change
SMRT_ROOT=/opt/smrtanalysis
on
SMRT_ROOT=/home/nick/smrtanalysis
the rest should be easy.
Be very careful installing binaries from internet, make sure you're confident in the source.
Just don't use root for that, you ran the script as root by accident.
(update: pacbio team can help from the github page at https://github.com/PacificBiosciences/SMRT-Analysis/issues as well.)

OS X permission denied for /usr/local/lib

I'm looking for any advice/intuition/clues/answers on a permission issue that has been plaguing me ever since I switched over to a new Macbook pro. Here's the dilemma. Certain programs copy libraries under /usr/local/lib during install and upon running these programs I get a crash which I believe is related to permission restrictions to files in this folder. I've had errors (can't access files from this path) trying to install plugins for audacity and then tried doing an "ls" under this folder. I immediately get permission denied unless I prefix the cmd with sudo. I've tried owning the /usr/local/lib/audacity folder with my user account and even still I get permissions errors on these files. It's important to note that the problem is not exclusive to Audacity. I've seen the same problem with Polycom video conference software and I've also been unable to run Parallels on this machine. (I haven't traced Parallels to the same issue but I'm betting its related.) I vaguely recall some weird Linux cmd magic I used to use back in the day that would not only grant permission to a user but tweak some low level bits allowing/disabling certain things like execution and I seem to recall the permission thing ran deeper than execution but its been years. I can't recall the detils and I'm wondering if there's something similar on OS X that I'm possibly overlooking. Is there something special about that location and the files there in? Could I have somehow altered my file system in a way tht the files appear different? For what its worth, I seem to be able to use at least one of the programs if I log in as root. I haven't tried with the other programs as I've just discovered the ability. Please help.
It sounds like the folder isn't world executable. Try:
sudo chmod 755 /usr/local/lib
and then you should be able to use ls or anything else in the folder (still won't allow you to write but your user account shouldn't be able to do that anyway)
Found the answer from a coworker buddy. The folder needed to be marked executable.
sudo chmod 755 /usr/local/lib
fixes everything!

Bash scripting and user home from root account (Linux)

I'm writing an install script in bash for an application on Linux.
This script copies some files into /usr/bin and /usr/share, so it needs to be executed by a root user, furthermore it makes an hidden directory in the $HOME dir for configuration files.
Here is the problem: if a normal user wants to install the program, he needs to be root. But if he is root, the $HOME directory will be /root/ instead of /home/username.
...and, further, if UserA installs the software, but UserB runs it, UserB won't have the hidden directory under /home/UserB. Also, the hidden directory under /home/UserA will be owned by root, not userA.
So, you need to have the application create the hidden directory, not the installer.
Another possible option is not to install in the system directories; one possible alternative location is /usr/local. However, even that can require root privileges. Think about whether it can be installed in other places, and how it could locate its materials.
However, requiring root privileges to install is not the end of the world - a nuisance for some, but not completely out of order. But requiring everyone who uses to have root privileges is way out of order - and if everyone who uses it needs to run the installer, that is bad.
Final point (for now): if you use sudo, it does not change the value of $HOME, even as you acquire root privileges. However, requiring everyone who uses your application to have sudo privileges is not a good thing either.
Must you use $HOME? Maybe you could prompt for the username and install to ~$username instead?

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