EbonJaeger Changed default file permissions of /root and $HOME to 0700
what does this mean ? what was it before? did it have the wrong permissions before?
Sync Updates for Week 25, 2023
- Edited
Lucien_Lachance
It is the default permissions those directories are created with. What it is set to depends on how old your account is but likely 0755
/root folder change is forced on existing installs. /home/username change is not.
New users created on existing up to date installs will have the more restrictive permissions but new installs won't unless done with Solus 4.4 and later versions since the older ISOs do not contain those changes.
What do I need to know
Your home folder is owned by your own user and group, so for example harvey:harvey
Octal permissions use numbers to represent permissions. The leading zero in a 4 digit octal is for a special bit which we are not and did not set prior. For simplicity from here on out we will ignore it as unless the value is changing it does not need to be explicitly stated when using chmod
If the number is 755 that reads owner|group|others
7 = Read, Write, Execute | 5 = Read, Execute | 5 = Read, Execute
You can play around with a permissions calculator if you would like to see more possibilities: https://chmod-calculator.com
First digit is fine of course the owner has full permissions. Second digit is okay but more restrictive is better, in order for someone to be a member of your usergroup you would have to manually add them to it.
Last digit is troublesome. It is 5 which means any other user account on the system has read & execute permissions to your home directory. Unless of course those files have more restrictive permissions. ~/.ssh/ is more restrictive by default for example.
You can see your permissions in octal using this command: stat -c "%a %n" /home/username
(obviously replace username with your actual username).
If it is not 700 and you would like the more restrictive permissions which I would advise, then run chmod 700 /home/username and you are done.
If you have no other users on your system there obviously is no issue but I would still advise changing permissions, who knows what the future holds and you might forget.
EDIT:
Note if you have samba shares in your home directory this will break it. So default permissions may change again or users will have to learn to change permissions should they want to setup up those shares 
EDIT2:
We are going 751 (1 is execute) as the default for home dirs to allow samba shares to still work. As always users can set whatever they want if they prefer more restrictive permissions and like I, do not want samba shares inside home.
Harvey Note if you have samba shares in your home directory this will break it.
Will this affect nfs shares that are mounted in /mnt and linked to my home directory with symlinks?
Just curious, mostly, not terrified. I do know how to use chmod. Should I plan on needing it after I install the new Solus from a new .ISO, or will my having been the one to create the symlinks make that unnecessary?
WetGeek Will this affect nfs shares that are mounted in /mnt and linked to my home directory with symlinks?
Depends which permissions you go with for home, if you are the only user accessing it and what permissions you have on the nfs mounts themselves.
Lets assume your username is wetgeek your home folder is set to 751 User wetgeek owns it so they have full permissions for them nothing has changed. User derek navigates to /home/wetgeek/ they can enter but they will see nothing. However they noticed the permissions and remember the folders path. they can navigate just fine to /home/wetgeek/nfsshare/ and everything is normal.
This is due to standard Linux folder permissions being 755 and files being644 The 1 allowed them in your home dir and the standard permissions let them do more. You can of course lock down your own sensitive files further while still having 751 set on the home dir but it is more to consider.
Same scenario but /home/wetgeek is 700 user wetgeek notices nothing different. derek can not enter the folder the end. They could still access it via /mnt/* tho.
WetGeek Should I plan on needing it after I install the new Solus from a new .ISO, or will my having been the one to create the symlinks make that unnecessary?
The file / folders owner has full permission so no further steps are required assuming you are happy with the new default.
- Edited
The Dev Tracker takes a different account? Well anyway, on the matter of Firefox VAAPI:
GPU: R9 270X
DE: Budgie
System: up to date - stable
After changes, About:support shows Compositing:Webrender, however all three line under WEBRENDER_COMPOSITOR are blocklisted.
There is no VAAPI section.
After starting Firefox, this shows in the console:
ATTENTION: default value of option mesa_glthread overridden by environment.
libva info: VA-API version 1.18.0
libva info: User environment variable requested driver 'radeonsi'
libva info: Trying to open /usr/lib64/dri/radeonsi_drv_video.so
libva info: Found init function __vaDriverInit_1_18
ATTENTION: default value of option mesa_glthread overridden by environment.
libva info: va_openDriver() returns 0!<
When going to the page of the Costa Rica video, which was served in VP9/opus, this seemed interesting:
Utility 5450: MediaSupervisor #1]: D/PlatformDecoderModule Agnostic decoder supports requested type 'audio/opus'
[RDD 5448: MediaPDecoder #1]: D/PlatformDecoderModule FFVPX: Initialising VA-API FFmpeg decoder
[RDD 5448: MediaPDecoder #1]: D/PlatformDecoderModule FFVPX: Format vp9 is not accelerated
[RDD 5448: MediaPDecoder #1]: D/PlatformDecoderModule FFVPX: Initialising FFmpeg decoder
[RDD 5448: MediaPDecoder #1]: D/PlatformDecoderModule FFVPX: codec vp9 : Google VP9
[Child 5353: MediaPDecoder #3]: D/PlatformDecoderModule Sandbox RDD decoder supports requested type video/vp9
[Child 5353: RemVidChild]: D/PlatformDecoderModule RemoteMediaDataDecoder[7f4729e8c350] ::RemoteMediaDataDecoder: 7f4729e8c350 is created
[RDD 5448: MediaSupervisor #1]: D/PlatformDecoderModule FFmpeg decoder supports requested type 'video/vp9'!<
According to wikipedia VP9 decode wasn't added by AMD until Raven Ridge APU/RDNA discreet, so sure enough it was software decoding. But it looks from the above that at least part of the process worked.
Mod edit: Fixed link 
Not having to install the flatpak version of easyeffects anymore sounds awesome. Thank you!
[deleted]
Introduced EasyEffects for PipeWire audio effects goodness
That's nice. I was just going to look up how the situation is under Solus, as EasyEffects (formerly PulseEffects) has the legacy maintenance branch for Pulseaudio and the newer one for Pipewire.
Solus 4.4 Harmony! Yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- Edited
Pipewire is activated per default or we have to do something. Because EasyEffects fails to run :
$ easyeffects
(easyeffects:480915): easyeffects-ERROR **: 10:04:13.794: pipe_manager.cpp:1463 context connection failed
Trappe pour point d'arrêt et de trace (core dumped)[deleted]
olivir Pipewire is not enabled by default.
- Edited
I'm having some problems with the MATE and Plasma .ISOs. I filed a bug report for the MATE .ISO, and I'll report one for Plasma, too, if I find out that I can't refer to one I've already created. The bugs are identical.
In preparation for creating a VM, I create a 32 GB virtual disk drive, and partition it like so:
I need a boot partition in order to do an efi-type boot, and a swap partition large enough for me to hibernate the VM.
With a disk like this, and choosing to use these partitions to install the OS, I had no trouble at all installing Budgie and GNOME. On MATE and Plasma, however, the boot partition was not recognized and a bootloader couldn't be installed there.
In the installers, the partitions are assigned to mount points, after choosing to use those partitions, their mount points are chosen on the next page. The swap and root partitions can be assigned to the swap and / mount points, but there is no mount point available for the boot partition. It's used according to its FAT32 format and (with GParted) the boot and esp flags that are set.
During the MATE and Plasma installations, on the next page, an error message is displayed, saying that a location can't be found for a bootloader, and one must be provided for an efi iinstallation. There's no way to continue. I've double-checked that the disks are created properly, as in the above image, and as a reminder, the Budgie and GNOME installations worked correctly.
Any advice from the team?
- Edited
WetGeek Since you already created an issue on the issue tracker (here, for anyone else that wants to follow along), I would say to watch that for responses. People may have additional questions or thoughts, and it would be good to have that all in one place. Also, if the same issue appears on another edition, you can just add that to the current issue. No need to create a separate one, I would say.
Also, thank you for filing issues on the tracker, that's exactly what we're looking for!
WetGeek an error message is displayed, saying that a location can't be found for a bootloader, and one must be provided for an efi iinstallation
I plan to continue by allowing the installer to partition the disk, but that will leave me with BIOS-based VMs that can't be hibernated, which is not my customary workflow. I'll need to create new ones if/when this bug is fixed.
- Edited
I'm going to abandon the MATE .ISO and try to install the Plasma edition. With MATE, I deleted the partitions I'd created, and let the installer create its own. That seemed to work fine. The bootloader was installed. The next page is shown here:
That's correctly filled in, my password and confirmation field match, and yet the [+Add now] button and the [Next] button remain disabled, so I can go no farther with it. With a new installer planned, I'll look forward to trying that.
WetGeek The icons indicate a problem with the username. Is there an extra space at the end, by accident?
@EbonJaeger : Looking at this page again, I notice a different symbol after the line with my user name. Before, I'd only checked the fields to be sure that my user name and the confirmation field agree, which they did here.
I don't know what could be wrong with "jerry" as a user name. It's what I've always used.
- Edited
I noticed that Swap Usage in Usage Monitor Raven widget is activated after the last or previous update(s). I am pretty sure I disabled it before.
- Edited
EbonJaeger Is there an extra space at the end, by accident?
I'll check it. These text fields should be trimmed in the code to prevent that from happening.
EDIT: Yes, that was it, one space at the end. It's now installing. Thanks for suggesting that.