Removing root privileges

[jagheterintelars]

Hello!

I installed Debian a couple of weeks ago. All went fine. I found all the answers for the questions I had. But a couple of days ago I ran into this simple problem which I really cant find an answer to, even though its probably the easiest solution.

The problem is that I made my own account into an administrator account (root account?) by exploring the graphical interface of the settings. When in the users section I clicked on the button that made me an admin.

As I prefer to operate as a normal user on a daily basis and only use the root privileges only when they really are needed, I would like to reverse these changes.

The button i clicked when i clicked to be an admin on this computer is not clickable anymore, and Ive searched a lot. But the only answers I find is how to make yourself an admin, and not how to take the privileges back. Very irritating. I dont know if its my limited english skills that makes me unable to find a solution online, or if no one in the world before me has wanted to remove their own admin privileges.

Thank you beforehand

Friendly regards,
/Hannes

[Head_on_a_Stick]

No idea what you mean by an "administrator account", that term is meaningless for GNU/Linux systems. Are you actually running Ubuntu? Seems like the kind of nonsense terminology they would use to ease confusion for the Windows refugees.

I'm only guessing but you probably mean that your user can gain root privileges with the sudo command so try

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sudo gpasswd -d $USER sudo

[arid]

No idea what you mean by an "administrator account"

I believe what he has accomplished is booting up into the root account. Easy way is to su in cli and startx. Now tell him how easy it is to fix it.

[Head_on_a_Stick]

I believe what he has accomplished is booting up into the root account. Easy way is to su in cli and startx.

Perhaps try actually reading the OP? They used an option in their graphical desktop.

EDIT: and what makes you think they identify as male?

[cuckooflew]

===edit----READ the bottom edit first !!!!!

The problem is that I made my own account into an administrator account (root account?) by exploring the graphical interface of the settings. When in the users section I clicked on the button that made me an admin.

Do what H-O_A_S says, or try searching, use the key words,

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How to remove administrative permissions on Debian 

Oddly enough all though I specifically said Debian, all the results are for Ubuntu, but should still be able to be used on Debian, :

jagheterintelars> I dont know if its my limited english skills that makes me unable to find a solution online, or if no one in the world before me has wanted to remove their own admin privileges.

I don't buy this, it is a common question, however, if English is not your language, do the search in your language, and it should return results in your language. If we knew what language, me or some one else could do a translation , maybe.

jagheterintelars> As I prefer to operate as a normal user on a daily basis and only use the root privileges only when they really are needed, I would like to reverse these changes

This is one of the many hits I got, when I did a search, one of the first , :

From:https://askubuntu.com/questions/335987/ ... g-the-user

You can also use gpasswd:

sudo gpasswd -d username sudo

This will remove username from group sudo.

Which is the same as what H_O_A_S suggested,... again, if the OP does not understand, due to lack of english skills, nobody can do a translation with out knowing what language to translate to...
Last note: See 'man gpasswd', for details on the command,..
FRom another hit:

from: https://linuxhint.com/sudo_linux/To remove a user from sudoers on Debian based distributions run the following command:

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deluser USERNAME sudo 

So, there is more then one way to skin a cat,....Take your pick on how you want to do this
===edit==IMPORTANT====
Make sure you do have a root account set up, before you remove your administrative privileges, you might need it one day.

[dankurth]

It's been awhile since this question was asked and I see there were some answers which work, but after running into the same situation myself and fixing it in a slightly different manner I'd like to add some perhaps useful context info.

First of all the manner of making the user "account into an administrator account (root account?) by exploring the graphical interface of the settings" on Debian 11 if using the default Gnome can involve just selecting Settings, then selecting Users, then unlocking the Users dialog and then in Account Settings toggling the switch for Administrator to on. Once this is done in the Users dialog there is only one way to undo it in that dialog and that is to make someone else the Administrator. It's as if once someone is chosen as Administrator you can't get rid of it, at least if you're using the GUI only. Behind the scene the user who is Administrator has had their username added to the "sudo" group in /etc/group, but that's not obvious if you don't know it. Once that username is removed from that group (using gpasswd as already explained, or other means to edit /etc/group directly) then the user will be "normal" again and the switch that was toggled to on for Administrator in the Users dialog (for that user) will be toggled back off again.

In my case I had made myself Administrator using the Settings|Users dialog (after unlocking the Users dialog by using the root password). To undo it I then logged out, then logged in on different terminal as root and using vim to remove my username from the sudo entry in etd/group, then rebooted system just to be sure everything was reset and still working, then logged in to Gnome desktop and checked Settings to find myself a normal user again.

[canci]

This sounds like an option that Gnome maybe should do away with. There's a reason why most of the root stuff happens in the command line and not in GUI. I can think of a million reasons how this could go terribly wrong.

[steve_v]

This sounds like an option that Gnome maybe should do away with.

To me, this sounds like the standard-issue oversimplified gnome-stupidity I've come to expect.

There is only One True Way to set up Desktop Linux, and that is to lock the root account (root is too confusing) and assign one user as Administrator (sudo is also confusing with all it's fine-grained access controls, but Administrator is nicely familiar to windoze refugees).
This of course means that if nobody is the anointed Administrator, there's no way to gain root privileges... So better make the already poorly explained idiot-mode radio-button mysteriously un-deselectable to keep the users from shooting themselves in the foot...
Yay for UX design by committee.

Or we could, ya know, leave out the button altogether and instead point people to the sudo man page so they understand what's really going on. Just a thought.

I can think of a million reasons how this could go terribly wrong.

Indeed.