You need to be in a special group (often: wheel)

[compis3]

After installaing Debian 11 running KDE plasma and when I go to Discover and then setting and attempt to open the software sources it asks for
admin password. When I use the root password it fails. i can use the root password for other functions like installing apps. This is a new installation and it does not accept my password. Why?

[reinob]

It's asking you for /your/ password, not for the root password.

[NorthEast]

It looks like it expects you to be in the sudo group and have sudo configured.

[compis3]

Should'nt the admin password be already in the group? why can I not access the software sources ?

[CwF]

If anyone would like to step through a process to determine if polkit can solve this issue, I'll try to be helpful! I don't use KDE.

I assume the package in question here is 'plasma-discover'?
I assume a default 'polkit' variant is also installed?
I assume root rights are somehow attainable in a terminal. CLI notation $ as user, # as root.

Note that 'wheel' is an arch thing and while group rights are a valid method it is also a conflation, along with sudo.

for fun, at least once, just to see;

Code: Select all

 $ pkexec plasma-discover 

Maybe, maybe not. I don't see any dependency by plasma-discover on any polkit mechanism, so I'd need to ask...

Code: Select all

 $ pkaction 

This should give a long list....
In that list there may be (com.ubunto.org.something...)plasma-discover.policy
Or perhaps something related like software-properties-qt.policy

If so, we may continue...
a preview may be;

Code: Select all

 $ pkcheck --process $$ --action-id $(found in above list) --allow-user-interaction --enable-internal-agent

...maybe?

[fabien]

I don't see any dependency by plasma-discover on any polkit mechanism

this is the dependency chain:
plasma-discover depends kio
kio depends libkf5authcore5
libkf5authcore5 depends libpolkit-qt5-1-1
libpolkit-qt5-1-1 depends libpolkit-agent-1-0, libpolkit-gobject-1-0

Code: Select all

Package: libpolkit-qt5-1-1
Source: polkit-qt-1
Version: 0.113.0-1
Installed-Size: 265KB
Maintainer: Debian Qt/KDE Maintainers <debian-qt-kde@lists.debian.org>
Architecture: amd64
Depends     ▼
 libc6 (>=2.14), libgcc-s1 (>=3.0), libglib2.0-0 (>=2.37.3), libpolkit-agent-1-0 (>=0.99),
 libpolkit-gobject-1-0 (>=0.105-12~), libqt5core5a (>=5.14.1), libqt5dbus5 (>=5.1.0),
 libqt5gui5 (>=5.1.0)|libqt5gui5-gles (>=5.1.0), libqt5widgets5 (>=5.1.0), libstdc++6 (>=4.1.1),
 default-logind|logind
Description-en: PolicyKit-qt5-1 library
 PolicyKit is an application-level toolkit for defining and handling the policy
 that allows unprivileged processes to speak to privileged processes.
 .
 It is a framework for centralizing the decision making process with respect to
 granting access to privileged operations (like calling the HAL Mount() method)
 for unprivileged (desktop) applications.
 .
 libpolkit-qt5-1 provides convenience classes and methods for Qt/KDE
 applications that want to use PolicyKit.
 .
 This package contains the files necessary for running applications that use
 the libpolkit-qt5-1 library.
Multi-Arch: same
Homepage: https://invent.kde.org/libraries/polkit-qt-1
Tag: role::shared-lib
Section: libs
Priority: optional
Filename: pool/main/p/polkit-qt-1/libpolkit-qt5-1-1_0.113.0-1_amd64.deb
Size: 61KB

[CwF]

libkf5authcore5 depends libpolkit-qt5-1-1
libpolkit-qt5-1-1 depends libpolkit-agent-1-0, libpolkit-gobject-1-0

Alrighty, thanks @fabien
so the pkaction list should have something to work with and make a rule. I would want to eliminate the password myself...

[compis3]

This is a newly installed Debian 32 bit with KDE and I am to understand that I must install more packages to access the preinstalled software and sources ?
Does this mean a installtion problem?

[Hallvor]

Did you try adding your user to the wheel group?

As root:

Code: Select all

# usermod -aG wheel yourrealusernamehere

(or whatever your username is).

Anyway, Discover isn't the best. I tried to change one of the sources, it asked for my root password, accepted it, and then did nothing. If you want to edit your sources.list, you can do it manually:

Code: Select all

# nano /etc/apt/sources.list

Make your changes, then Ctrl+x, then confirm with y to save and exit.

[p.H]

Should'nt the admin password be already in the group?

This question makes no sense.
Groups contain users, not passwords.
There is no such thing as an "admin password". There is your (user) password, and there may be a root password. The dialog in your screen shot seems to ask for your user password, not the root password. But it won't help if your user does not have the required privileges.

If your question was actually " shouldn't my user account already be in the sudo group ?", the answer is yes if you did not set a root password during installation, and no otherwise.

Note that 'wheel' is an arch thing

I have seen it in openSUSE, which has little to do with Arch.

Did you try adding your user to the wheel group?

In Debian, sudo does not use the "wheel" group by default. It uses the "sudo" group.

[Hallvor]

I didn't mention sudo: https://wiki.debian.org/WHEEL/PAM

[CwF]

I'm still curious if polkit works for KDE like it does for XFCE. I'm not so motivated to try it...

[compis3]

I think the problem is I created a root password and the KDE is not able to use the user password for access. But it doesn't acept the root password either. Only when i initiate a cli with the root password it works.

[CwF]

...if you could, post results

Code: Select all

ls /usr/share/polkit-1/actions/

then I'd have an idea if KDE can be passwordless.