NAME
op - operator access
SYNOPSIS
op mnemonic [arg]
DESCRIPTION
The op tool provides a flexible means
for system administrators to grant trusted users access to certain
root operations without having to give them full superuser
privileges. Different sets of users may access different
operations, and the security-related aspects of environment of each
operation can be carefully controlled.
OPTIONS
- -V
- Show version number.
- -l
- List available commands. Note that this will only display
commands you are permitted to run.
CONFIGURATION
Configuration entries are read from /etc/op.conf and all
files in lexical order from /etc/op.d with the extension
.conf. Files must be owned by root and not have
group or other permissions set.
The fields of the entries in the configuration files are
separated by white space. Each entry may span several lines and
continues until the next alphanumeric string is found at the
beginning of a lines (which is taken to be the next mnemonic or
variable definition, and thus the beginning of a new entry).
Comments may be embedded beginning with a # character. Each entry
in the configuration files has the following form:
-
mnemonic command
[ arg ... ] ; [ option ... ]
or
- var=value
where the fields are interpreted in the following
manner:
- var
- a variable name, which must be an upper case alphanumeric
identifier. Variables are expanded when reading options.
- value
- the remainder of the line is taken to be the value of the
variable.
- mnemonic
- a unique, alphanumeric identifier for each operator function.
- command
- the full pathname of the executable to be run by op when
the associated mnemonic is chosen.
- arg(s)
- any arguments, either literal or variable, needed by
command. Literal arguments are simply specified directly,
like specific command options (0Gun) or files
(/dev/rmt20). Variable arguments are specified here as
$1, $2 ... $n; these are described more fully in the
options section below. $* indicates any number trailing
arguments.
- option(s)
- a set of optional parameters to specify settings or restoring
for the particular mnemonic, define variable arguments
specified for the command, space and are of the form
keyword=value. The absence of a specific list of values
separated by commas, where appropriate. There should be no white
space in each element of the value string unless quoted. The
keyword is any of the following types:
- uid
- Set the user id to the value specified. The value can be
numeric user ID or a login name. The default is root.
- gid
- Set the group id's to the values specified. Each value can be a
numeric group ID or a group name.
- dir
- Change the current working directory to the path specified.
- chroot
- Change the root directory to the path specified using
chroot.
- umask
- Set the file creation umask to the octal value specified. The
default is to set it to 022.
- groups
- Allow any user who belongs to a group listed here to execute
this op function. The default is not to allow any specific
group. Note that the user and group strings are always treated as
regular expressions, meaning the user name 'a' will match *any*
user with the letter A in their name. In addition, group@hostname can be used to
explicitly allow access only on specific hosts.
- users
- Allow any user listed here to execute this op function.
The default is to not allow any specific users. You may use the
regular expression .* to indicate that all users may use this
mnemonic. User expressions are in the form
<user>[@<host>][/<expiry>] where <user> is
a regular expression matched against the current system user,
<host> is a regular expression matched against the systems
hostname and <expiry> is a time in the form YYYYMMDD[hh[mm]]
when that users access to the command expires.
- netgroups
- Allow any user who belongs to a netgroup listed here to execute
this op function. The default is not to allow any specific
netgroup.
- password
- Queries the user for a password. If there is an = part the
value is the crypted password required, otherwise the users own
password is asked.
- securid
- Queries the user for SecureID PIN and code. If op has been
compiled without SecurID support, this option will cause the
command to fail with an error message.
- $VAR
- where VAR is the name of an environment variable. The
specified environment case, simply using $VAR with no = part (as
in $USER) means that this environment variable is
inherited unchanged from the caller's shell. If the $VAR is an
assignment the environment variable is set to the specified value
in the new environment.
- environment
- Disables the destruction of the users environment.
- help
- Define help for this mnemonic. Defaults to the full command.
op -l will display this help when it lists the available
commands. eg. help=This is some help
- nolog
- Disables informational logging per command. Useful for cron
jobs to avoid spamming the logs. Note that authentication failures
and other errors will still be logged.
- fowners
- Specifies the owner and group of the target command executable
as a list of regular expression in the form user:group If
the executables ownership does not match, the command will not be
executed.
- fperms
- As with fowners but matches against the octal
permissions of the executable.
- xauth
- Attempt to propagate the X authority entry for the current
display to the new users X authority file. The DISPLAY environment
variable is also propagated to the new environment. The destination
user is determined by first using the user specified after
xauth=..., then the user specified by uid=... then finally the root
user is used.
- $n
- defines the nth variable argument specified in the
command arg list. The value for this type may be a
comma-separated list of regular expressions using egrep(1).
option defines the range of values allowed for the variable
arguments A variable argument specified as a command arg but
not described in the options section may take on any value.
If an argument does not match any of its permitted values, then a
diagnostic is printed and the command is not executed. When using
'(' syntax to pass values to other options, only the next options
can use values from the previous search.
- $*
- is used in the options section to place restriction on
the trailing arguments specified as $* in the args section.
If any of these (possibly many) arguments do not match, then a
diagnostic is printed, and the command is not executed.
There can also be a special entry in the file beginning at the
first non-comment line that can define default values to override
the builtin defaults listed here, yet still be overridden by any
entry that wants to redefine any of the keyword fields described
above. It should have the following format:
-
DEFAULT
keyword_option
where keyword_option is a
keyword=value string mentioned above under options.
It should be noted that if any regular mnemonic entry
defines its own option, the value given for that entry must
explicitly include the item from the DEFAULT line if the default
values is to be included. That is, the options definitions
completely override any defaults; they do not add to them In this
way, if a value specified on the DEFAULT line for users or
groups (for example) needs to be "erased" without redefining
new values (that is, we want no users or groups to be allowed to
run the mnemonic), then the default value must be overridden with
nothing (as in users=). For the users or
groups fields, such a null setting has the effect of setting
the list of allowable users or groups to be empty. For the other
keywords ( uid, gid, dir, chroot, and umask), a null setting
leaves that attribute as it is upon invocation of the op
program, overriding any defaults.
Another note is that if the command for a mnemonic
is MAGIC_SHELL then a shell (using the users $SHELL
environment variable) is created, if there are arguments in
addition to the mnemonic on the command line then the shell
is invoked "-c args".
EXAMPLES
Example /etc/op.conf:
-
# Define some users
OPERATORS=(fred|barry)
# Define hosts that Fred is restricted to
FRED_HOSTS=(alpha|beta)
# Define hosts that Barry is restricted to
BARRY_HOSTS=(theta|gamma)
# Define user/host access list
ACCESS_LIST=fred@FRED_HOSTS|barry@BARRY_HOSTS
# 'op shell' - gives user a root shell
shell
/bin/su -;
users=ACCESS_LIST
environment
password
help="Root shell"
# 'op reboot' - reboot system
reboot
/sbin/reboot;
users=ACCESS_LIST
password
help="Reboot system"
# 'op shutdown <time>' - shutdown at a
# certain time. Restricts argument to
# valid values only
shutdown
/sbin/shutdown -h $1;
users=ACCESS_LIST
$1=(now|[0-1]?[0-9]:[0-9][0-9]|2[0-3]:[0-5][0-9]|+[0-9]+)
help="Shutdown system"
# Switch inetd on and off, shows complex
# shell example and 'string' arguments. $1
# in this example is expanded by op
inetd /bin/sh -c '
case $1 in
on) /usr/sbin/inetd -s ;;
off) /usr/bin/pkill inetd ;;
esac
';
users=ACCESS_LIST
$1=on|off
FILES
- /etc/op.conf
- Access control description file.
- /etc/op.d/*.conf
- Access control description files.
SEE ALSO
sudo(1),
su(1),
chroot(2),
egrep(1)
CREDIT
Op: A flexible Tool for Restricted Superuser
Access, originally by Tom Christiansen , CONVEX Computer
Corporation, Proceedings of the Large Installation Systems
Administration III Workshop. Further changes by Howard
Owen , currently maintained by Alec Thomas.
BUG REPORTS TO
alec@swapoff.org
COPYRIGHTS
© Copyright 1991 by
David Koblas © Copyright
2002-2005 by Alec Thomas