On running gui applications as root

[Simon Farnsworth]

On Thursday 19 Nov 2015 12:48:50 Andrew Haley wrote:
> On 11/18/2015 06:49 PM, Adam Jackson wrote:
<snip> 
> > Phrased another way: no, it's not *your computer* we're talking about
> > here. The computer in question rightfully belongs to someone else; we
> > are here discussing how to be responsible for the code they allow us to
> > run on it.
> 
> That is a reasonable point for view.  However, the point of Free
> Software is freedom; and the ability to shoot oneself in the foot is
> part of that freedom.  One of the greatest advantage of Free Software
> from my point of view is that people can choose.  And I know that I am
> not alone in chooing to use (and to write) Free Software for that
> reason: freedom is not just about strict licence compliance.
> 
> Five years or so ago I publicly defended Wayland because I was assured
> that things would continue to work after the transition.  Being able
> to edit files with emacs is an essential part of that "continuing to
> work."
> 
I don't see how a lack of access to the GUI when running as root will prevent 
Emacs from editing root-owned files.

TRAMP (if you wish to stay inside emacs) and "sudo -e" (if you'd rather work 
outside emacs) both provide mechanisms (that I use today under X11) for emacs 
to edit root-only files while the vast bulk of emacs runs as my user ID.

Put another way: "sudo emacs /etc/hosts" will break under Wayland. "sudo -e 
/etc/hosts", "emacsclient /sudo::/etc/hosts" and "emacs /sudo::/etc/hosts" 
will all still work as they do today, as will "emacs --eval (find-file 
/sudo::/etc/hosts)"

-- 
Simon Farnsworth