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IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE .\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL .\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS .\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) .\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT .\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY .\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF .\" SUCH DAMAGE. .\" .\" from: @(#)su.1 8.2 (Berkeley) 4/18/94 .\" $NetBSD: su.1,v 1.41 2005/04/05 18:46:33 christos Exp $ .\" .Dd April 5, 2005 .Dt SU 1 .Os .Sh NAME .Nm su .Nd substitute user identity .Sh SYNOPSIS .Nm .Op Fl Kdflm .Op Fl c Ar login-class .Op Ar login Op Ar "shell arguments" .Sh DESCRIPTION .Nm requests the Kerberos password for .Ar login (or for .Dq Ar login Ns .root , if no login is provided), and switches to that user and group ID after obtaining a Kerberos ticket granting ticket. A shell is then executed, and any additional .Ar "shell arguments" after the login name are passed to the shell. .Nm will resort to the local password file to find the password for .Ar login if there is a Kerberos error. If .Nm is executed by root, no password is requested and a shell with the appropriate user ID is executed; no additional Kerberos tickets are obtained. .Pp Alternatively, if the user enters the password "s/key", authentication will use the S/Key one-time password system as described in .Xr skey 1 . S/Key is a Trademark of Bellcore. .Pp By default, the environment is unmodified with the exception of .Ev USER , .Ev HOME , .Ev SHELL , and .Ev SU_FROM . .Ev HOME and .Ev SHELL are set to the target login's default values. .Ev USER is set to the target login, unless the target login has a user ID of 0, in which case it is unmodified. .Ev SU_FROM is set to the caller's login. The invoked shell is the target login's. With the exception of .Ev SU_FROM this is the traditional behavior of .Nm . .Pp The options are as follows: .Bl -tag -width Ds .It Fl K Do not attempt to use Kerberos to authenticate the user. .It Fl c Specify a login class. You may only override the default class if you're already root. See .Xr login.conf 5 for details. .It Fl d Same as .Fl l , but does not change the current directory. .It Fl f If the invoked shell is .Xr csh 1 , this option prevents it from reading the .Dq Pa .cshrc file. If the invoked shell is .Xr sh 1 , or .Xr ksh 1 , this option unsets .Ev ENV , thus preventing the shell from executing the startup file pointed to by this variable. .It Fl l Simulate a full login. The environment is discarded except for .Ev HOME , .Ev SHELL , .Ev PATH , .Ev TERM , .Ev USER , and .Ev SU_FROM . .Ev HOME , .Ev SHELL , and .Ev SU_FROM are modified as above. .Ev USER is set to the target login. .Ev PATH is set to the path specified in the .Pa /etc/login.conf file (or to the default of .Dq Pa /usr/bin:/bin:/usr/pkg/bin:/usr/local/bin ). .Ev TERM is imported from your current environment. The invoked shell is the target login's, and .Nm will change directory to the target login's home directory. .It Fl Same as .Fl l . .It Fl m Leave the environment unmodified. The invoked shell is your login shell, and no directory changes are made. As a security precaution, if the target user's shell is a non-standard shell (as defined by .Xr getusershell 3 ) and the caller's real uid is non-zero, .Nm will fail. .El .Pp The .Fl l and .Fl m options are mutually exclusive; the last one specified overrides any previous ones. .Pp Only users in group .Dq wheel (normally gid 0), as listed in .Pa /etc/group , can .Nm to .Dq root , unless group wheel does not exist or has no members. (If you do not want anybody to be able to .Nm to .Dq root , make .Dq root the only member of group .Dq wheel , which is the default.) .Pp For sites with very large user populations, group .Dq wheel can contain the names of other groups that will be considered authorized to .Nm to .Dq root . .Pp By default (unless the prompt is reset by a startup file) the super-user prompt is set to .Dq Sy \&# to remind one of its awesome power. .Sh CUSTOMIZATION .Bl -tag -width "" .It Changing required group For the .Xr pam 8 version of .Nm the name of the required group can be changed by setting .Ar gname in .Xr pam.conf 5 : .sp .nf auth requisite pam_group.so no_warn group=gname root_only fail_safe .fi .sp For the non .Xr pam 8 version of .Nm the same can be achieved by compiling with .Dv SU_GROUP set to the desired group name. .It Supplying own password .Nm can be configured so that users in a particular group can supply their own password to become .Dq root . For the .Xr pam 8 version of .Nm this can be done by adding a line to .Xr pam.conf 5 such as: .sp .nf auth sufficient pam_group.so no_warn group=gname root_only authenticate .fi .sp where .Ar gname is the name of the desired group. For the non .Xr pam 8 version of .Nm the same can be achieved by compiling with .Dv SU_ROOTAUTH set to the desired group name. .It Indirect groups This option is not available with the .Xr pam 8 version of .Nm . For the non .Xr pam 8 version of .Nm , if .Dv SU_INDIRECT_GROUP is defined, the .Ar SU_GROUP and .Ar SU_ROOTAUTH groups are treated as indirect groups. The group members of those two groups are treated as groups themselves. .El .Sh EXIT STATUS .Nm returns the exit status of the executed subshell, or 1 if any error occurred while switching privileges. .Sh ENVIRONMENT Environment variables used by .Nm : .Bl -tag -width "HOME" .It Ev HOME Default home directory of real user ID unless modified as specified above. .It Ev PATH Default search path of real user ID unless modified as specified above. .It Ev TERM Provides terminal type which may be retained for the substituted user ID. .It Ev USER The user ID is always the effective ID (the target user ID) after an .Nm unless the user ID is 0 (root). .El .Sh EXAMPLES To become user username and use the same environment as in original shell, execute: .Bd -literal -offset indent su username .Ed .Pp To become user username and use environment as if full login would be performed, execute: .Bd -literal -offset indent su -l username .Ed .Pp When a .Fl c option is included .Em after the .Ar login name it is not a .Nm option, because any arguments after the .Ar login are passed to the shell. (See .Xr csh 1 , .Xr ksh 1 or .Xr sh 1 for details.) To execute arbitrary command with privileges of user .Em username , execute: .Bd -literal -offset indent su username -c "command args" .Ed .Sh SEE ALSO .Xr csh 1 , .Xr kinit 1 , .Xr login 1 , .Xr sh 1 , .Xr skey 1 , .Xr setusercontext 3 , .Xr group 5 , .Xr login.conf 5 , .Xr passwd 5 , .Xr environ 7 , .Xr kerberos 8 .Sh HISTORY A .Nm command existed in .At v5 (and probably earlier).