Creating and managing user groups

Although it is fine to simply leave a new user such as john in his or her own user group, you may prefer to also assign new users to another unique group. This affords not only an easier time in managing users rights, it also offers a means to share files, etc.

You do not have to assign new users to a group, the default is that they are assigned to their own personal group. But if you prefer to do so, below are the key steps.

Step 1. Start the users and groups tool

As mentioned above, access the tool from your main menu. However, instead of making changes or using the options on the “Users” tab, click on the “Groups” tab.

Scroll down until you see your new user. Notice that a group with the user’s name has also been added.

Step 2. Add a group

Now, press the Add Group button.

Figure 4: Adding users to a specific group

Notice in my example (see figure 4) that I’ve created a new group named “desktopusers”, and then highlighted my new user john. By pressing the Add button in the middle, I will add john to the group. You can add multiple users by holding down the Ctrl key and highlighting as many as you wish. Just be sure to press the Add button once you are done choosing.

Press OK when you are satisfied that all the users who belong in your new group were added (figure 5).

Figure 5: Successfully added new group

Notice that on your main “Users and Groups” window, the new group was added to the bottom of the list. Press OK again to save the changes.

That’s it! In the future, to change users in a particular group you can use the same steps above. But instead, highlight the group to change and press the Properties button.

What you enabled with this new group is that users, such as a working group of colleagues or friends, can now share files and manage folders that were given desktopuser group access.

Understanding the superuser

I briefly mentioned above that there are three key users in Ubuntu. This section will clarify why certain attributes exist, and what the key differences are between root and the initial user account.

Notice that in order to apply any of the steps above you needed to be logged in and use the initial Ubuntu account. The first account you create, during installation, is automatically assigned super-user do rights (also called sudo). With a super-user account, system administration and modification is possible.

The most powerful super-user account in GNU/Linux is root. However, you’ll notice that a root account is not automatically included in your Ubuntu installation details. The root does not, by default, come enabled for your use.

In situations where you must use superuser privileges, Ubuntu allows you to use the initial account combined with sudo. If for example you wanted to delete a basic user’s file folder from under Home, you would use the following commands from the command (terminal) prompt:

cd /home
sudo delete john

To run the sudo command you will be prompted for your initial user password. This prevents you from having to run as root to do basic system administration, while protecting your system from security weaknesses associated with fully enabling another account as superuser.

What about root?

Ubuntu hides the root account somewhat in order to discourage its use, unless absolutely necessary. Instead, almost all of the power and privileges needed for administration are assigned to your initial account.

But what about those instances where you plan to perform some major modifications or enhancements to your Ubuntu system? I must state that this is unlikely to ever be the case for a beginning user. But, if you are in a situation similar to myself, trying to add something as major as perhaps the LTSP to your Ubuntu (edubuntu.org already has some good options for new users who want this), then you may need to apply root.

Again, before you press ahead to enable your root account, I want to convey that you should not be using root for day-to-day administration. Nor should you follow the steps below if you are brand new to Ubuntu and read some document that says “you need to be logged in as root”. Instead, use sudo as described above to run such commands.

If you’ve gotten this far, you don’t need anymore disclaimers just a simple answer. To enable root in Ubuntu you use the same steps as mentioned in section 1. However, you highlight the root user account and then press the Properties button. From there you can set the root password by hand and press OK twice to save your changes. I just urge you not to become a habitual root account user and to stick with the initial account and sudo when possible.

Troubleshooting

It’s a rare thing for me to hear about problems creating and managing users. However, there are a few things to keep in mind.

Login failure

If you created a new user account based on the steps above and get a strange error, you may have a simple problem with the user’s properties. The errors you may see include: $Home/.dmrc not properly configured, or that the HOME/user does not exist and the default directory will be temporarily set to /root.

In both cases, the error was caused by the new user’s folder not being properly configured or created. You can resolve this easily enough, by simply deleting the user and starting the steps above again. But this time, also click on the Advanced tab, when adding user, and ensure that the line for Home directory reads: /home/$user

Obviously, this only applies during initial creation of a new user account.

Changes do not save

I’ve encountered this more often than you would imagine. It seems that people sometimes get confused when pressing the OK button during the steps above. You must not only press the OK button on the specific properties Window, but also press OK once again on the main Users and Groups window in order to save your changes.

Conclusion

You should now have all the key steps needed to create and manage multiple user accounts on Ubuntu. More importantly, you should also have a reasonable understanding of what to do if you need to run a command or perform an action that requires “root access”. By applying these steps, you can share the power and pleasure of your Ubuntu system with others, while retaining security and stability.