Lock Screen as root (SOLVED)

[Erik Hemdal]

> From: Les Mikesell <lesmikesell at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: Lock Screen as root

> On Fri, 2006-05-26 at 22:24, Tim wrote:
> 
> > > But if this is so dangerous, why not prevent graphical root logins
> > > altogether?
> > 
> > Some distros do that.  And it is possible to set up Fedora that way
> as
> > well - it stops a graphical "login", but it doesn't stop a textual
> login
> > from starting X after the login.
> > 
> > One reason why distros don't do that is the number of users
> insisting
> > that they should be able to.
> 
> And the seriously strange concept of having GUI admin tools but
> not being able to run them from a menu, or the likely-risk-prone
> concept of having special authentication techniques to start
> them from a window manager running as a different user.
> 
> -- 
>   Les Mikesell
>    lesmikesell at gmail.com

With my thanks to Jon McCann, I found the answer here:

http://www.jwz.org/xscreensaver/faq.html#root-lock

with Jon's note that gnome-screensaver behaves as xscreensaver does.
This makes sense and explains what appears at first blush to be
misbehavior.

As an aside, I also tried this under KDE, and discovered that I _can_
lock the screen while logged in as root.  I haven't been able to explain
that one yet.  But if I discover an answer, I'll post.

Erik