In that case you can use sudo to run command as root user. The su command is the traditional way of acquiring root permissions on Linux. sudo just elevates your privileges to root for the current command. sudo command in Linux is a program used for non-privileged users to provide privileged access of another user, mostly superuser access. With the explanations out of the way for each command hopefully you can already see the key differences between the two. [email protected]:~ sudo apt-get update su command. su command helps us to switch current user to another. In one of our earlier articles, we discussed the 'sudo' command in detail.Towards the ends of that tutorial, there was a mention of another similar command 'su' in a small note. I have no idea what may have caused this, this is the first time I'm running these commands since I'm following a Linux course. This cmmand standrs for “switch user”. When running sudo -i i get sudo: 5.8: command not found, sudo su outputs su: failed to execute 5.8: No such file or directory and su outputs su: Authentication failure. The usage of su implies the knowledge of the "other" user password except if invoked by root. su and sudo allow to execute commands or shell with a different user. To ensure that your account has this privilege, you must be added to the sudoers file. The sudo command has existed for a long time, but Ubuntu was the first popular Linux distribution to go sudo-only by default. Using sudo -i is virtually the same as the sudo su command. It is used to run commands which require special privileges to execute. You can change your user to the superuser in a shell using the su command. Differences between sudo and su command. su is also switches to root account. Like: sudo -u root 'systemctl restart apache2' Run Command As Another User with Runuser. Much like sudo su, the -i flag allows a user to get a root environment without having to know the root account password.sudo -i is also very similar to using sudo su in that it’ll read all of the environmental files (.profile, etc.) Differences Between su and sudo. To run successfully use sudo before apt-get update command. It's reccomended to use sudo instead of su if possible, but to return to your normal account after calling su, simply use the exit command The sudo privilege is given on a per-user or per-group basis. When you install Ubuntu, the standard root account is created, but no password is assigned to it. Both "su" and "sudo" allow to execute commands on behalf of other user. While some think they can be used interchangeably, a few subtle differences exist between the two. Users can gain root by “sudo” and not by switching to the root user. sudo command allows a regular user to execute or perform system-level commands that are a special reserve for the root user. You can also use runuser to run commands as another user in Linux systems. Well, in this article, we will discuss in detail the 'su' command as well as how it differs from the 'sudo' command. Becoming a super user. There exists some misconception about the usage of sudo and su commands. They are indeed quite similar in some aspects, the ‘su’ command is basically equivalent to ‘sudo -i’, while the ‘sudo’ command is basically equivalent to ‘su … Now that you know how to use this command, let’s look at how to configure the sudoers file.. In this article, we will look into 10 Popular Examples of sudo command in Linux(RedHat/CentOS 7/8). Other Linux Distributions. The sudo command runs any Linux command as the superuser. For instance, you need sudo access to modify a system file. These are two important commands used to implement security in Linux, in regards to user management policy and user permissions. This is lesser known commands by the Linux users. Depending on how they are invoked the environment variables can change, causing different command results. Just type the user-name after the su command, it will ask for the password (target user's password). You don't need to use sudo and su together--su switches your user account (without arguments it switches you to root). In an earlier article, we have explained to you the difference between sudo and su commands in Linux.