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Package Management Tools

Running dpkg

dpkg can be run at two levels. Many of the information features of dpkg

are available to an unprivileged user account. For tasks like removing and

installing packages, root privilege is required. This root privilege may be

obtained from tools like sudo or su if root login is undesirable. Scripts that

use dpkg to install or remove packages must either be run with root privilege

or have the facility to gain root access for the critical operations.

sudo is provided as an alternative to logging in as root to obtain those priv 

ileges. Entries in the controlling file (/etc/sudoers) determine the commands

that a given user can execute with root privilege. In this way, individuals

or groups may be given access to areas of the system which are normally off

limits.

What's with all this need for root access? Isn't it dangerous to use root for

such a simple thing as package installation? Well, look at it from another

point of view. Would you wish any user on your system to be able to install a

potentially important package on your system? Those, hopefully, few people

that are trusted to do the maintenance jobs that require root access are also

those folks who should be trusted to install and remove packages.