Password works for some things, not for others

[Hoary]

In another thread I complained that I couldn't install any printer driver. I understand the immediate problem, if not the solution. I believe that the reason why I can't install a printer driver is that I'm not really in Administrator Mode.

I'm the only user of this computer, ever. The system knows nobody other than "hoary", who has a password that I'll here pretend is "hatespam".

Today I restarted the system, logging in as hoary with hatespam. That worked. Screen resolution was too high (I still haven't got around to changing the maximum). I went to screen settings, clicked the "Administrator Mode" button, told it hatespam. No acknowledgment that I was in AM, but the "AM" button greyed out so I inferred I was in AM. I changed the resolution setting.

The system restarted. The resolution was unchanged. "Huh?" I thought.

I tried doing it again, this time deliberately using a dud password: gg instead of hatespam. No difference. (No error message, and I was not told that I'd used the wrong password.)

I little icon at the bottom right of my screen told me that there's more stuff to download for "Dapper". Aha, I thought: perhaps something relevant to my problems. I gave Adept my password of hatespam. That worked fine. (I downloaded, installed, and I'm now bang up to date, I think.)

I opened a console and typed "su". I was prompted for my password. I typed in hatespam. "su: Authentication failure", I was told.

This is not a capslock issue. (The capslock diode works fine, is bright when it's on, and has not been on.) I'm not the world's greatest typist but I am capable of typing the string hatespam without a slip.

I can't think of any password other than hatespam, which after all does let me start a session, use Adept, etc.

Um . . . ?

(I did try a bit of searching hereabouts, but didn't know which keywords to use. Of course "Administrator Mode" brings a shinolaload of messages. One alluded to a similar problem as a known bug of KDE 3.4 -- but mine's 3.5.4.)

[arochester]

Re: Password works for some things, not for others

Use "System Settings" to change things... K Menu>System Settings

To add a printer use K Menu>System Settings>Hardware>Printers>Add Printer

The command is not "su" it's "sudo"

To change the a password use K Menu>System Settings>Personal> User Account>Change Password

[Hoary]

Re: Password works for some things, not for others

Use "System Settings" to change things... K Menu>System Settings

To add a printer use K Menu>System Settings>Hardware>Printers>Add Printer

That does not work. I believe that the reason is that Administrator Mode doesn't work. (More below.)

The command is not "su" it's "sudo"

I realize that sudo is recommended. I thought su was supported. (I just wanted to use it to prove to myself that I was, or wasn't, in administrator mode.) I'll return to sudo below.

To change the a password use K Menu>System Settings>Personal> User Account>Change Password

Now that's a good idea. Yes, I used it to change my PW from hatespam to lovespam. No error message was displayed.

Having changed my PW to lovespam, I decided to change screen resolution. I clicked "Administrator Mode", with PW lovespam. I changed resolution. X Window (or whatever) restarted (of course I had to type in my PW lovespam, which worked). Resolution was unchanged.

sudo l

with PW lovespam tells me that user hoary can do "(ALL) ALL [newline] (ALL) ALL".

I'd love to change screen resolution. But today, I'll settle for the installation of a usable printer driver.

System settings | hardware | printer | Administrator Mode "lovespam"

("Administrator Mode" greys out; no error message)

Add | Add printer/class | Backend selection Local printer | LPT#1 ("parallel:/dev/lp0") | Printer Model Selection: HP LaserJet 3P w/ PCL5" | Driver selection "Foomatic + ljet 4":

Unable to load the requested driver:

Unable to create the Foomatic driver [HP-Laserjet_3P_w_PCL5,ljet4]. Either that driver does not exist, or you don't have the required permissions to perform that operation.

My emphasis, of course.

All right, maybe the driver doesn't exist. Just as an experiment, I tried installing the driver for an HPLJ5L. (I had one of those for a year. It loaded four pages in five at an angle. What a dog.) I know I have hpijs installed (I've already checked), so I choose the driver "Foomatic + hpijs".

Same error message: "Unable to load the requested driver" blah blah blah.

I'm sure that the reason is that I'm not properly in Administrator Mode. AM, and/or my password (old or new) consistently works for some purposes and consistently does not work for others.

(Yesterday, I tried giving a random short string as my password when attempting to get into Administrator Mode. The feedback from that was just the same as it was when I used my real PW: no explicit confirmation, no error message, but a greying out of the "Administrator Mode" button. I thought I'd try that again now, but for some reason the AM button is already greyed out so I can't.)

[Ahem!] Any other tips would be gratefully accepted.

[chep]

Re: Password works for some things, not for others

What I have been doing to run things in admin mode is to open the program by right clicking on it and selecting "Put into Run Dialog" then it opens a small run window.

At that time there is a small drop down options. CLick it

Then I select Run as a different user. I use "root" and enter the password.

[Hoary]

Re: Password works for some things, not for others

What I have been doing to run things in admin mode is to open the program by right clicking on it and selecting "Put into Run Dialog" then it opens a small run window.

At that time there is a small drop down options. CLick it

Then I select Run as a different user. I use "root" and enter the password

I don't think that this option exists for system settings. Still, I thought I'd create a new user and log on as him.

Uh-oh, in order to create the second user, one has to be in Administrator Mode. But I managed to create the second user. I logged out and logged in with my new ID. A new password was demanded; I supplied it. I went straight to screen settings and tried to get into Administrator Mode. However, this new ID for the new user didn't work: for the first time ever, I was told I'd used the wrong password. (Contrast that with deliberately using a nonsense password earlier but not being told I'd used the wrong password.)

I logged back as my regular ID, went to screen settings, clicked the Administrator Mode button, and supplied my regular PW. I was not told that I'd used the wrong PW. I changed the screen resolution. The session restarted -- with the unchanged screen resolution.

This is intercoursing ridiculous. A week or so ago I could and did change the screen resolution. If I can't even do that, I'm sure I'm wasting my time trying to install a printer driver. So I suppose I must keep writing my OOo files to MS Turd .DOC format, copying these to flash memory, carrying this to a 'Doze machine in another office, and printing from that. The extremely minor silver lining is that I'm wasting their printer toner rather than mine, but I look and feel like an idiot, it's a waste of my time, and [blush] I find myself looking at the fully functional 'Doze machine with more than a little envy.

Two options seem obvious. (i) Switch to 'Doze. (ii) Suicide.

Say it ain't so. . . .

[Goobers]

Re: Password works for some things, not for others

so far, this has only to do with the printer...

http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/index.php?topic=8117.0

more specifically, the command:

sudo foomatic-cleanupdrivers

for whatever reason... the access to the database is  faulty... so by clearing it, it allows the OS to "fix" it's connection. at least, that's my theory.

you DO have admin access... it's just sometimes the OS has a "hick up" and things fail. couple times i've had problems with adept failing... and then prevent ALL admin access. which is fixed by another command (though i forgot what it was)... too bad i didn't find it BEFORE a few reinstalls. 

[chep]

Re: Password works for some things, not for others


I don't think that this option exists for system settings.

It does. As a matter of fact I noticed that I can only do this from the "start menu" .. However it sounds like your system is faulty and that a re-install would be in order.

You know it sounds wrong but whenever I encounter major problems with any OS I usually can it and reinstall it again or another one. Whether that be windows or linux. I'm not saying it's right or it's wrong. But if it worked out for you it may put your mind to rest.

[Hoary]

Re: Password works for some things, not for others

You know it sounds wrong but whenever I encounter major problems with any OS I usually can it and reinstall it again or another one.

Ah, that brings back memories! Yes, multiple reinstalls of Windows95! Life was so simple back then: blue screens of death, freezes, virus hysteria -- but at least I between those thrills I could print and read the screen without a magnifying glass (sniff).

Of course slapping in the CD, installing, and upgrading the packages wouldn't take long. But jeez: switching the keys around, installing Japanese input, copying back my own files, copying back my own email (Kontact), re-creating the email filters: that'd be another three full days down the drain. Of course what I'd want to do is to write over all the Linux/GNU/KDE/Kubuntu bits, leaving intact my deliberate changes/additions to this. I don't know if that would work (clearly the installation process would be unable to distinguish between my deliberate changes/additions and whatever it was that caused my system to go screwy). But I could try. However, neither this nor this nor this seems to say anything about either (a) writing a clean Kubuntu on top of a strange one (even just that it's impossible or stupid) or (b) migrating rather painlessly from one Kubuntu to another. Any tips (e.g. on where I might read more)?