shutdown command

[jenaniston]

Originally Posted by Rusher

I've just confirmed that, too. It fits my previous post.

Is there anyone that can easily check whether shutdown -h over SSH requires root without other users being logged in? It is only confirmation, but it's something.

So . . . my Fedora 15 just gave me the

Must be root

message,
even though no other users/terminals.
but changing the username to have admin privileges should be all I need to shutdown -h now
without being root . . . I think.

[jpollard]

Using the "shutdown" by itself (no options or parameters) always seems to give the "Must be root" message.

When that happens try "shutdown -h now" (with options). F18 allows this even when "shutdown" does not work... as long as there are no other users.

Try it on F17.

[jenaniston]

Originally Posted by jpollard

Using the "shutdown" by itself (no options or parameters) always seems to give the "Must be root" message.

When that happens try "shutdown -h now" (with options). F18 allows this even when "shutdown" does not work... as long as there are no other users.

Try it on F17.

I only use "shutdown -h now" as the way to cleanly turn off especially to avoid mounting/unmounting manually - USB drives are ok with shutdown -h now

My point exactly is that there may be distro differences at least between F15 and F18 . . .
it was my experience with F15 that always got me to switch user to root before logging off -
F17 and F18 we have seemed to verify it is a matter of having another user somewhere on the field -
typically me but in a root terminal on a multiple desktop.

[jpollard]

Shutdown should be a privileged operation though.

Any login considered local can shutdown the system if no one else is logged in - just give options.