638
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 08 Jul 2024
638 points (96.9% liked)
Programmer Humor
32572 readers
124 users here now
Post funny things about programming here! (Or just rant about your favourite programming language.)
Rules:
- Posts must be relevant to programming, programmers, or computer science.
- No NSFW content.
- Jokes must be in good taste. No hate speech, bigotry, etc.
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
You don't run VLC as root because you don't especially trust that build of VLC
We don't run random stuff as root because it's a stupid risk. We try to only take necessary risks. Risks that make things easier. Running random programs as root gains you nothing and causes annoyance in that you need to fix permissions on its configuration files if you want to run out as a user
There is nothing stopping you though if you want to set up a Linux machine where you log in as root, run a desktop environment as root, run apps as root. You're unlikely to be taking an unreasonable risk as a home user.
For the reasons you described, I won't run VLC as root, and I don't think 99% of users would need to. But if someone wanted to do it, the software shouldn't stop them from doing it (beyond giving a warning and asking them to confirm).