Q&A for How to Become Root in Ubuntu

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I read the article and tried gksudo on Ubuntu, but it doesn't work. I learned that it is abolished by most flavors of Linux. What do I do?

Thomas J. Jordan Sr.

Community Answer

gksudo won't work in a Wayland session; switch to an Xorg session and try.

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How to administer password created by command?

Jisjo

Community Answer

You can create a root password by command line. In Linux root has Administrator like the Windows Operating system. Use this below command to set root password: $ sudo passwd root.

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Question

i did the steps for enabling and setting password for root but after typing: " sudo - " it still says su: Authentication failure. What should I do?

Jisjo

Community Answer

The error "su: Authentication failure" shows for an incorrect password login. Give the correct password to fix this. Also, there is no command like "sudo - ", refer to the article for correct usage.

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Question

When I try to save a file to the xsessions folder, it still says that I don't have the permissions necessary to save the file. How can I resolve this?

Jisjo

Community Answer

Check the directory permission using the "ls" command and change accordingly with the "chmod" command.

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Question

There is no need to use gksudo on Ubuntu. Rather, use sudo.

Jisjo

Community Answer

"gksudo" is for the GUI form to enter the privileged user password. If you were to use "sudo," then it will ask for the password in the CLI itself.

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Question

i did the steps for enabling and setting password for root but after typing: " sudo - " it still says su: Authentication failure. What should I do?

Nithik R

Community Answer

Looks like you have confused yourself between sudo and su. "sudo" stands for "Super-user Do" and it is used for performing administrative tasks. "su" stands for "Switch User". You can switch to super-user(also called root) by typing "sudo su" or "su -" Remember, "sudo su" is for temporary use and you need to enter your own password but for "su -" you need to enter the root password.

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