Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!husc6!psuvax1!flee
From: flee@shire.cs.psu.edu (Felix Lee)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Things that root can't do (Re: setuid (euid) ...)
Message-ID: <FLEE.89Apr4224732@shire.cs.psu.edu>
Date: 5 Apr 89 02:47:32 GMT
References: <123@cat.Fulcrum.BT.CO.UK> <1800008@spdyne> <1197@auspex.UUCP>
Sender: news@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu
Organization: Penn State University Computer Science
Lines: 18

In article <1197@auspex.UUCP>,
   guy@auspex.UUCP (Guy Harris) writes:
>Yes, just keep running as "root", and you won't have to worry about any
>of this - if you're "root", you shouldn't have to bother with set-UID
>stuff at all, right? :-)

There are things normal users can do that root cannot, such as fail to
open a file :-)

One interesting thing that is harder to do as root is to kill all of a
user's processes:
	setuid(uid);
	kill(-1, sig);
which is useful in privileged-kill programs.

How about a definition of root by what root can't do?
--
Felix Lee	flee@shire.cs.psu.edu	*!psuvax1!shire!flee