Run script as admin (prompt for password) from xfce GUI

Question

I have a mount script I need to run as admin. Since nobody knows how to run it automatically, I want to at least reduce the pain of manual start. The script has one line:

sudo mount ... more params

When I select execute, nothing happens:

image description

I also tried this answer, no effect. If I run the script from terminal, everything works.

Answer 1

You could set up a sudo rule such that either all users, some specific users, and/or all members of a particular group can run the script without a password. e.g. in /etc/sudoers:

Cmnd_Alias MYSCRIPT = /usr/local/sbin/mountscript.sh
...
...
cas ALL = NOPASSWD: MYSCRIPT
%admin ALL = NOPASSWD: MYSCRIPT

That allows user cas and all members of group admin to run /usr/local/sbin/mountscript.sh as root without needing to enter a password.

mountscript.sh should be extremely simple. It would be best if it took no arguments and no input at all from the user, and just performed a fixed set of operations (e.g. mount the filesystem in a particular location and then exit)

If required, you could also have an unmountscript.sh set up in sudo in the same way... just add /usr/local/sbin/unmountscript.sh to the end of the Cmnd_Alias definition line.

Finally, your icon on the desktop would either:

1. run sudo /usr/local/sbin/mountscript.sh or
2. run a wrapper shell script which did nothing except sudo /usr/local/sbin/mountscript.sh

in both cases, all scripts mentioned should be mdae executable with chmod

Answer 2

You can use gksudo which is a GTK+ frontend for su/sudo.

sudo asks for the password on the command line, and gksudo pops up a dialog box for it.

Relevant manpage

• Tomáš Zato: I replaced sudo with gksudo in my script and I still observe nothing. Definitely not a dialog window.
• Jan: Well, that's strange. Open a terminal window, type gksudo whoami and tell us what happens. If you haven't configured your user otherwise, a GUI prompt asking your password should pop up.