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mmccaskill

Member

From: NC

Registered: 2005-02-21

Posts: 165

su and export

I have written a file that sets some variables for my oracle 10g instant client.
file: /etc/profile.d/oracle-instant-client.sh

export ORACLE_HOME=/usr/lib/oracle/10.1.0.3/client
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/lib/oracle/10.1.0.3/client/lib

Now this works for a normal user but when using "su" the LD_LIBRARY_PATH disappears. Why is this?

cactus

Taco Eater

From: t͈̫̹ͨa͖͕͎̱͈ͨ͆ć̥̖̝o̫̫̼s͈̭̱̞͍̃!̰

Registered: 2004-05-25

Posts: 4,622

Website

Re: su and export

use

su -m

man su

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skoal

Member

From: Frequent Flyer Underworld

Registered: 2004-03-23

Posts: 612

Website

Re: su and export

I don't think the preserve parent shell environment is what he needs.

I think even if he does use this, it won't work.

If I'm not mistaken, LD_LIBRARY_PATH will never be inherited by subshells.  This has to do with the suid bit on terms, keeping a well known exploit from occuring.

I think that's the case here...

sol'n? you got me...

I'd stick that library path in "/etc/ld.so.conf" and be done with it.  I don't know if that's what you need though.

mmccaskill

Member

From: NC

Registered: 2005-02-21

Posts: 165

Re: su and export

Yeah thanks. Sticking it in /etc/ld.so.conf worked great. I need it to get oracle instant client sqlplus to work.

skoal

Member

From: Frequent Flyer Underworld

Registered: 2004-03-23

Posts: 612

Website

Re: su and export

When I first read your post, I scratched my head for a second.  I remembered for some reason trying the same thing years ago.  I soon realized you can't, unless you remove the suid bit I think.

Xentac

Forum Fellow

From: Victoria, BC

Registered: 2003-01-17

Posts: 1,797

Website

Re: su and export

That's right, as a security thing, suid binaries ignore LD_LIBRARY_PATH.  That way sneaky users can't add their own libraries and have root execute them.

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- Blaise Pascal

bogomipz

Member

From: Oslo, Norway

Registered: 2003-11-23

Posts: 169

Re: su and export

I had to hack my way around this a while ago. What I ended up doing was setting LD_LIBRARY_PATH_PROFILE="$LD_LIBRARY_PATH" in .bash_profile, then LD_LIBRARY_PATH="$LD_LIBRARY_PATH_PROFILE" in .bashrc. This worked like charm as long as I started X from the console. When I deployed a display manager I had to include the first assignment in .xinitrc as well.

Would it be a good idea if /etc/profile set LD_LIBRARY_PATH_PROFILE after sourcing all the profile.d scripts? Then all the user would have to do is restore LD_LIBRARY_PATH in .bashrc, it could even be in the default rc, just not for root.

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