Bug 494481

Summary:	Running an app with elevated privileges (sudo) forces other app to run under sudo
Product:	[Plasma] plasmashell	Reporter:	Matty R <dev>
Component:	general	Assignee:	Plasma Bugs List <plasma-bugs-null>
Status:	RESOLVED DOWNSTREAM
Severity:	normal	CC:	ad.liu.jin, kde, nate
Priority:	NOR
Version First Reported In:	6.1.4
Target Milestone:	1.0
Platform:	Fedora RPMs
OS:	Linux
Latest Commit:		Version Fixed/Implemented In:
Sentry Crash Report:

Description Matty R 2024-10-10 19:23:26 UTC

SUMMARY
I tried running 'Game Conqueror', and when it launches it asks for elevated privileges, once the application has launched and in the application you select to load a file, it will launch it's own file browser as root, but also it causes Nextcloud which I have in my system tray to re-launch another instance also running as root

STEPS TO REPRODUCE
1. Have Nextcloud desktop running in system tray as your user account
2. Launch Game Conqueror, select to load/browse the file to load a saved config from disk

OBSERVED RESULT
This spawns a new instance of a number of things running as root, such as Nextcloud desktop. Things also listed under the application are things like xdg-desktop-portal and xdg-document-portal (also running as root)

EXPECTED RESULT
Doesn't relaunch irrelevant programs as root

SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS
Operating System: Nobara Linux 40
KDE Plasma Version: 6.1.5
KDE Frameworks Version: 6.6.0
Qt Version: 6.7.2
Kernel Version: 6.11.2-202.fsync.fc40.x86_64 (64-bit)
Graphics Platform: Wayland
Processors: 16 × AMD Ryzen 7 5800X 8-Core Processor
Memory: 31.2 GiB of RAM
Graphics Processor: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti/PCIe/SSE2

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
I wasn't sure what other category to raise this under - apologies.

Comment 1 Nate Graham 2024-10-10 19:37:12 UTC

So wait, when you run this app as root, Nextcloud — all on its own — launches a new instance also running as root?

Comment 2 Matty R 2024-10-10 20:04:29 UTC

(In reply to Nate Graham from comment #1)
> So wait, when you run this app as root, Nextcloud — all on its own —
> launches a new instance also running as root?

Yep, exactly.

Comment 3 Jin Liu 2024-10-11 01:59:26 UTC

(In reply to Nate Graham from comment #1)
> So wait, when you run this app as root, Nextcloud — all on its own —
> launches a new instance also running as root?

The nextcloud client can be launched via dbus: `/usr/share/dbus-1/services/com.nextcloudgmbh.Nextcloud.service`.

It also registers as plugins to Dolphin, Nautilus and a few other file managers.

So it's not that surprising that something launches it when running as another user, although I'm unclear what exactly that "something" is.

Comment 4 Bug Janitor Service 2024-10-26 03:46:54 UTC

🐛🧹 ⚠️ This bug has been in NEEDSINFO status with no change for at least 15 days. Please provide the requested information, then set the bug status to REPORTED. If there is no change for at least 30 days, it will be automatically closed as RESOLVED WORKSFORME.

For more information about our bug triaging procedures, please read https://community.kde.org/Guidelines_and_HOWTOs/Bug_triaging.

Thank you for helping us make KDE software even better for everyone!

Comment 5 Matty R 2024-10-26 06:04:59 UTC

Information was reported.

Comment 6 Nate Graham 2025-04-08 19:58:36 UTC

Well, the situation described here is exceptionally strange, but as it involves exclusively 3rd-party apps acting in non-recommended ways (e.g. running as root). I'm very doubtful that there's anything we can do in Plasma to stop or fix this. I'd recommend reporting the issue to Nextcloud first. It sounds really weird that their tray item would quit and re-launch itself parented to a root-owned app.