access to USERS AND GROUPS without privilege

[shrek-m at gmx.de]

t. scott urban wrote:

>This is a feature - gnome implemented something like ssh-agent.  After
>entering root password to configure things, gnome keeps the password for
>you for a short time so that you can make other system changes.
>
>If you have the notification area panel applet running, you should see a
>set of keys icon show up there after you entered root's password.  As
>long as you see that icon, you have access to the system tools from the
>menu without the entering the password again.
>
>You don't have access to root privileges in general, though, as you
>found, only applications started via gnome.
>
>If you're worried about leaving you terminal unattended, you can click
>on the keys icon and tell it to forget the password.
>

afair it is

$ rpm -qf `which  pam-panel-icon `
usermode-gtk-1.74-1

it seems that the key-icon is not displayed if you execude a 
root-application from the gnome-terminal.
it would be nice if someone could give me a hint how to change/control 
the time for "keeping authorization" for this one because there is no 
visual control.

thanks

-- 
shrek-m