[sudo-users] per-user editor for visudo

[Todd C. Miller]

On Sun, 31 Jul 2016 08:54:19 +0200, balducci at units.it wrote:

> I did consider that and, actually, with the following:
> 
>   Defaults:root   editor=/usr/bin/nano
> 
> visudo uses nano, overriding the --with-editor=/usr/bin/emacs option at
> build time (however, aside, I have also noticed that with both the
> Defaults:root entry above and a global:
> 
>   Defaults editor=/usr/bin/emacs:/usr/bin/nano
> 
> emacs is used; ie apparently the global Defaults wins)

The last match wins, which in this case is the global Defaults line.

> However, and here I'm probably misunderstanding something, if I have:
> 
>   Defaults:balducci  editor=/usr/bin/nano, \
>                      timestamp_timeout=-1,        \
>                      !env_reset, \
>                      !tty_tickets
> 
> then running "sudo visudo" picks all options (but for the editor) for
> balducci; which makes sense to me: I run visudo as root, but sudo knows
> who I actually am and loads my default options.
> 
> So: why is "sudo visudo" honoring all options for balducci, but for the
> editor? what am I missing?

Because it is not sudo that uses the "editor" setting, it is visudo
that does and visudo is being run as root, not balducci.  I've
committed a change in visudo to check the SUDO_USER environment
variable and use that if it is set and visudo is run as root.

A better option might be for sudo to pass the editor for visudo on
the command line, which I am considering.

 - todd