[sudo-users] Feature request - chdir option

[Michael Hill]

On Mon, Oct 17, 2005 at 07:28:07AM -0700, Ladner, Eric (Eric.Ladner) wrote:
>Is this not equivalent (and shorter)
>
>	$ sudo ls -l /usr/local/protected

For my (decidedly trivial) example, yes.  My fault for choosing a poor
example.

Here's a closer approximation to the real-life scenario I was asking
about.

For an upgrade of a third-party vendor's humongous software package, the
installer has to follow pages of procedures of the form:

	$ su -
	<enter root password>
	# cd /foo/bar/dir
	# ./custom_vendor-supplied_program
	# ./yada_yada_yada
	# ./and_so_forth

The installer does not have permission to 'cd' into /foo/bar/dir and
for various reasons it may not be desirable to open up permissions
for the duration of the upgrade.  Furthermore, the (poorly written)
custom_vendor-supplied_program must be run with /foo/bar/dir as its cwd.
Finally, the installer doesn't necessarily have the skills to come up
with workarounds involving alternate sudo commands, and instead insists
he/she must have 'sudo ksh' to accomplish the upgrade.  (If you haven't
ever run into any of these factors in the Real World (tm), I envy you.
:^)  )

In a situation like this, a simple "sudo -C /foo/bar/dir
./custom_vendor-supplied_program" would be exactly what we need.

I hope that helps.

-- 
			--Michael

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Michael Hill   <><  Isaiah 9:6 |
michael AT mhill DOT net       | http://federalistpatriot.us/news/sorry.asp
Aerospace/Software Engineer    | 
http://www.qadas.com/~msh/     |
---In a marketplace (like the one of ideas), not everything has equal value!---
Did you ever notice that everybody in favor of abortion has already been born?!
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: </pipermail/sudo-users/attachments/20051017/5e6e1b5d/attachment.bin>