linux4noobs @programming.dev Ponziani @sh.itjust.works 5mo ago

Make sudo command not need sudo?

I would like to set a specific command to not require sudo privileges, is there a way to accomplish this? I know you can add commands to the sudoer file to allow certain commands to be used by non root accounts, so maybe there is something similar for adding commands to allow regular users to use?

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So, you mean that you want specific users who don't have "sudo" in their list of supplemental groups in /etc/group to also be able to invoke specific commands with sudo, but not arbitrary ones? Sure, you can do that.

The line in /etc/sudoers in Debian that lets members of group "sudo" run arbitrary commands with "sudo" is this:

# Allow members of group sudo to execute any command %sudo ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL

But you can have individual users in there too. Here's an example of setting a specific user to being able to run the whoami command and apt command as root, without requiring a password to do so:

https://www.baeldung.com/linux/sudo-privileges-user

baeldung ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: /usr/bin/apt, /usr/bin/whoami

If you're gonna modify /etc/sudoers, though, use visudo to do so:

$ sudo visudo
- Well my other comement saying this is exactly what i need did not get posted as a reply to your comment, my mistake. I followed rhe example for "/usr/bin/wg/" intending to be able to use
  
  wg show
  
  but it still requires sudo. I tried rebooting and nothing changed, any ideas? I did
  
  type -a wg
  
  to get the command location for the sudoer file.
  
  Well my other comement saying this is exactly what i need did not get posted as a reply to your comment, my mistake.
  
  What the line I listed will do will let a specific user have permission to use sudo without a password to run wg as root without a password. So they (and not other users) can type:
  
  $ sudo wg
  
  And the command will run as the root user, without them being prompted to enter a password.
  
  It doesn't mean that when that user runs:
  
  $ wg
  
  In their shell, what will actually run is:
  
  $ sudo wg
  
  If you also want to avoid typing the extra characters, you can set up an alias in your shell.
  
  I don't know what shell you're using, but most Linux systems use bash as a default:
  
  $ ps PID TTY TIME CMD 1413558 pts/3 00:00:00 bash 1413640 pts/3 00:00:00 ps $
  
  If you're using bash, you can tell your current bash shell invocation to do that with the alias command:
  
  $ wg Unable to access interface wg0: Operation not permitted $ alias wg='sudo wg' $ wg interface: wg0...
  
  If you want that command run in every bash shell you invoke, you can do so by editing ~/.bashrc and adding the line:
  
  alias wg='sudo wg'
  
  Awesome now I understand what you and the other commenter were talking about with aliasing. Well this works perfect without the alias, many thanks

12 comments