Description of problem: wlassistant gives unknown error when opening in GNOME (wlassistant icon). I think that the PAM file for wlassistant is wrong or something. It should ask for the root password. When I open in a terminal window it runs. Here is a snippet of text from the console. I am a normal user. wlassistant kbuildsycoca running... Loaded application options. All interfaces: eth0, wlan0 Wireless interface(s): wlan0 warning: /etc/resolv.conf not writable Permissions checked. DHCP Client: dhclient All executables found. scan: /sbin/iwlist wlan0 scan Networks found: 1 Application options saved. Kernel socket closed. In a gnome window it says "You may have insufficient permissions for Wireless Assistant to function properly. Did you run it using 'sudo'? OK button I run the as root from the console and it works fine. When I an a normal user I should be able to run the wlassistant icon and it should prompt me for a root password.... Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): wlassistant.i386 0.5.7-3.fc7 wlassistant.i386 0.5.7-1.fc7 How reproducible: Happens every time. Steps to Reproduce: 1. Run icon 2. error comes up
Created attachment 206001 [details] My pam.d file for wlassist
This bug remains unresolved in the newest version, wlassistant-0.5.7-4.fc8, but I think some clarifications to the original bug report are due. Executing, without root privilages, /usr/sbin/wlassistant on the shell command line results in a pop-up window with the error message: "Unknown error". Exactly the same happens when clicking, without root privilages, on System -> Preferences -> Wireless Assistant since the latter also executes /usr/sbin/wlassistant On the other hand, executing `wlassistant' on the command line opens up first the Wireless Assistant window, and a moment later a window saying: "You might have insufficient permissions for Wireless Assistant to function properly. Did you run it using 'sudo'?" Just hit `OK', or press `Enter', at this point. Note that the full path to `wlassistant' is /usr/bin/wlassistant, while /usr/sbin/wlassistant is a symbolic link to /usr/bin/consolehelper Executing /usr/sbin/wlassistant as a root seems to have the same effect as executing /usr/bin/wlassistant Thus, a probable cause of the bug is a typo in the file /usr/share/applications/fedora-wlassistant.desktop Proposed solution: change '/usr/sbin/wlassistant' to '/usr/bin/wlassistant' in that file. A temporary workaround that does not require root privilages: 1) go to System -> Preferences -> Look and Feel -> Main Menu 2) in the `Menus' pane click on System -> Preferences 3) in the `Items' pane right click on `Wireless Assistant' 4) select `Properties' 5) change '/usr/sbin/wlassistant' to '/usr/bin/wlassistant' Caveat: There was an earlier bug report https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=243271 about "wlassistant with sudo changing .ICE authority". I don't know how serious that can be. Neither do I know whether this still affects the newest version of Wireless Assistant. If in doubt, execute `wlassistant' or `/usr/sbin/wlassistant' as root from the command line.
No, this is not correct. The /usr/sbin/wlassistant symlink is designed so that it can hook into pam, and have the user prompted for the root password, and then run with root permissions. It used to leverage pam_console for this, but that no longer works, and I apparently broke things when I made that change. I'm working on fixing this properly now, should knock all of the (filed) wlassistant bugs out.
wlassistant-0.5.7-5.fc7 has been pushed to the Fedora 7 testing repository. If problems still persist, please make note of it in this bug report. If you want to test the update, you can install it with su -c 'yum --enablerepo=updates-testing update wlassistant'
wlassistant-0.5.7-5.fc8 has been pushed to the Fedora 8 testing repository. If problems still persist, please make note of it in this bug report. If you want to test the update, you can install it with su -c 'yum --enablerepo=updates-testing update wlassistant'
wlassistant-0.5.7-5.fc7 has been pushed to the Fedora 7 stable repository. If problems still persist, please make note of it in this bug report.
wlassistant-0.5.7-5.fc8 has been pushed to the Fedora 8 stable repository. If problems still persist, please make note of it in this bug report.