'disk utility' vs. sudo

[rayandrews]

So I fire up the 'Disk Utlity' (which is splendidly useful), pick a disk, hit 'Format Drive', select 'Master Boot Record', hit 'Format', hit 'Format' again (at the 'are you sure' msg.) ... and *then* it gives me 'Error formatting drive' and on hitting 'Details' I see that I need to be root to do that

Why oh why oh why doesn't 'Disk Utility' either give me the option of typing in my root PW (like so many other things do) or at least tell me when I first hit 'Format' that I'm not going to be able to do it? As it is, I hafta log out of my user account, log in as 'root' format the drive, log out as 'root' and log in as user again and it seems so dumb.

<rant>
You know, I accept some of the difficulties of using Linux as simply part of the the facts of life in using a a FOSS system, and of course things get better every year. But things like the above strike me as just sloppy and they ruin my morning. I love LMDE and I don't want to sound toooo [upset], but I do wish that the team could clean up these little irritations before wowing me with some latest-greatest innovation.
</rant>
There, now I feel better

[zerozero]

next time you might consider gparted (is pre-installed in lmde); asks you straight away for your pw and you can then do all your tweaking without interruption

[rayandrews]

zerozero,

Thanks, yes, that works, but why not have the same thing for 'Disk Utility'? Nothing bugs me more than loose ends and inconsistency.
Oh and I notice you edited me, I think I know the 'bad word', didn't think it was beyond the pale, but I'll be more careful from now on.

[zerozero]

yeahh see the Forum Rules, session 1 [2] http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=83314

[rhodry]

<rant>
You know, I accept some of the difficulties of using Linux as simply part of the the facts of life in using a a FOSS system, and of course things get better every year. But things like the above strike me as just sloppy and they ruin my morning. I love LMDE and I don't want to sound toooo [upset], but I do wish that the team could clean up these little irritations before wowing me with some latest-greatest innovation.
</rant>

Whilst I understand your frustration ( been using Linux > 20 years), this is not an issue that should be directed at the Mint team! Mint is a distribution of Linux,meaning it is a conglomerate of many many applications developed by hundreds of different application developers. It is them to whom your rant/suggestions should be directed. If the application is found in the Linuxmint repositories then it is their baby, however, if it is in the Ubuntu/Debian/PPA/anywhere else repositories; how it functions is purely a matter for the developer of that application. You have three options;

1. learn to use it as offerred;
2. convince the developer to change his/her approach; or
3. obtain the source code and write your own version! ( This is Linux after all!)

On this particular app (just playing devils advocate here) you could argue it is more dangerous to be using root user (sudo) from get-go as in gparted than it is to allow you to browse dangerous actions without allowing change unless you select to do so?!

In any case, not an issue for Mint team if they did not develop/modify it!

just my 0.02
rhodry.

[rayandrews]

Whilst I understand your frustration ( been using Linux > 20 years), this is not an issue that should be directed at the Mint team! Mint is a distribution of Linux,meaning it is a conglomerate of many many applications developed by hundreds of different application developers. It is them to whom your rant/suggestions should be directed. If the application is found in the Linuxmint repositories then it is their baby, however, if it is in the Ubuntu/Debian/PPA/anywhere else repositories; how it functions is purely a matter for the developer of that application. You have three options;

1. learn to use it as offerred;
2. convince the developer to change his/her approach; or
3. obtain the source code and write your own version! ( This is Linux after all!)

On this particular app (just playing devils advocate here) you could argue it is more dangerous to be using root user (sudo) from get-go as in gparted than it is to allow you to browse dangerous actions without allowing change unless you select to do so?!

In any case, not an issue for Mint team if they did not develop/modify it!

just my 0.02
rhodry.

Good points rhodry. I'm not pointing fingers at anyone in particular, but at everyone in general. As to who is 'responsible' for the state of any given piece of software I can't speak with any authority, but in the case of Disk Utility, it comes with the base install, and I know the Mint team has added and modified many things (eg. Gnome>Cinnamon) to suit, so I don't know why they couldn't do the same for Disk Utility. From the reverse perspective, there are distros like Slack and Arch that make a point of advertising that they never make modifications to packages, and that tells me that other distros have a more hands on approach, so maybe it isn't out of line to suggest that Mint make Disk Utility and Gparted more consistent. I dunno, for me consistency is just a huge plus for any distro, far more important that eye candy.