Fwd: what is operator group for?

Jeff Rollin jeff.rollin at gmail.com
Tue Jan 2 14:22:23 PST 2007


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Jeff Rollin <jeff.rollin at gmail.com>
Date: 31-Dec-2006 19:43
Subject: Re: what is operator group for?
To: Chris Whitehouse <chris at childeric.freeserve.co.uk>



On 31/12/06, Chris Whitehouse <chris at childeric.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>
> Hi all
>
> I sent this once already but didn't see it come back, sorry if it has
> appeared twice.


AFAIK it has only come up once, so that's OK.

can anyone tell me what the operator group is for, or docs where I can
> read about it? I see that /sbin/shutdown and /sbin/mk_snap_ffs are both
> executable by members and various things in /dev/ are mountable by them.


Originally things were set up that way so that people in the "operator"
group could mount disks and tapes, shut the machine off, etc. root would do
the system administration itself (removing rootkits, etc.)

Well, when I say "originally" I mean "when the operator group was added to
the system". I don't think it existed in early versions of UNIX.

Jeff


-- 
Now, did you hear the news today?
They say the danger's gone away
But I can hear the marching feet
Moving into the street

Adapted from Genesis, "Land of Confusion"

http://latedeveloperbasketcase.blogspot.com


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