Hello fellow lemmings

I am a long-time i3 user and have decided to switch to Sway. I have encountered a weird error which has left me utterly bamboozled.

I am using Ubuntu 24.04 which has gone from 20.04 -> 22.04 -> 24.04. It has Ubuntu-Gnome, i3 and Sway currently installed.

The issue

The error that I’m facing is when I’m using Sway, I simply don’t have sudo access.

This is what the error looks like

$ sudo visudo
[sudo] password for xavier666:
Sorry, user xavier666 is not allowed to execute '/usr/sbin/visudo' as root on <HOSTNAME>.

When I switch back to i3, my permissions are fine for the same user. I have not done any crazy modifications to the sudoer’s file as far as I can remember.

PS: I have added a command to no-sudo xavier666 ALL = NOPASSWD: /usr/bin/brightnessctl

The “fix”

I temporarily solved it by adding xavier666 ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL to the sudoer’s file.

IMO, I think this should not be required. I don’t remember ever adding the default user to the file for all the installations that I have done. (But this is the first time I’ve installed Sway)

Logs/Outputs

Running sudo -l without the fix (on Sway)

Matching Defaults entries for xavier666 on <HOSTNAME>:
    env_reset, mail_badpass,
    secure_path=/usr/local/sbin\:/usr/local/bin\:/usr/sbin\:/usr/bin\:/sbin\:/bin\:/snap/bin,
    use_pty

User xavier666 may run the following commands on <HOSTNAME>:
    (root) NOPASSWD: /usr/bin/brightnessctl

When I run the same command on i3, i get this (ALL : ALL) ALL extra line in the output. And when I run sudo -l with my fix on Sway, (ALL : ALL) ALL is present and the permission issue is fixed.

What is causing Sway to remove the root permission for the user?

Note: I’m just asking for the standard sudo behaviour. I’m not trying to run GUI applications as root.

  • Ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    1·
    16 hours ago

    Can you compare groups output under both sessions?

    Specifically, if you don’t show membership of sudo in your Sway session, try this

    loginctl enable-linger lazarus

    • xavier666@lemm.eeOPEnglish
      2·
      15 hours ago

      Inisde i3 WITHOUT FIX

      $ groups

xavier666 adm cdrom sudo dip plugdev lpadmin lxd sambashare

$ groups xavier666

xavier666 : xavier666 adm cdrom sudo dip plugdev lpadmin lxd sambashare

      Inside sway WITH/WITHOUT FIX

      $ groups

xavier666 root

$ groups xavier666

xavier666 : xavier666 adm cdrom sudo dip plugdev lpadmin lxd sambashare

      PS: I corrected the username, it should be xavier666. I corrected the main post.

      • A_norny_mousse@feddit.org
        1·
        7 hours ago

        $ groups

        xavier666 root

        Sorry what? As what user are you executing all these ‘groups’ commands? Unless Ubuntu does things significantly differently from Arch and Debian, there’s something very fishy going on here. The “normal” user should not be in the root group, and root should not be in the normal user’s group.

        Have you done other things beside the “fix” you mentioned?

        That “fix” from your op, btw, looks totally valid to me.

      • Ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone
        1·
        15 hours ago

        Try enable-linger. As I understand it, the issue is related to the way Sway handles Wayland sockets, and enable-linger kicks things off before Sway is involved.

        • xavier666@lemm.eeOPEnglish
          1·
          14 hours ago

          I’m unsure how to use the command. I added it to the main Sway config file, which means it’s executed whenever Sway starts (Post login).

          However, it didn’t make any difference. I also ran it manually

          $ loginctl enable-linger xavier666
$ sudo visudo
[sudo] password for xavier666:
Sorry, user xavier666 is not allowed to execute '/usr/sbin/visudo' as root on <HOSTNAME>.