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What is root? How do I "become root?"

by bobjensen — last modified Feb 27, 2008 01:54 PM
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"root" is the name of the user who can control everything on the entire computer. We call this the "super user."

Applicable to Fedora Versions

  • Fedora 7+

Requirements

Requirements including prerequisite reading or packages

Doing the work

  1. To become root, first you must open a terminal. Then, you type:

    su --login

    Note that the "--login" is very important -- it sets things so that you have easy access to all the commands on the computer.

    Then, you have to type in your root password. You set this when you installed Fedora.

Troubleshooting

How to test

Common problems and fixes

If you're using the "open a terminal" method where you make the whole screen into a terminal, then you just need to put "root" as your "Login:" name, and then enter the correct password.

More Information

Disclaimer

We test this stuff on our own machines, really we do. But you may run into problems, if you do, come to #fedora on irc.freenode.net
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