On Mon, 22 Oct 2007 15:39:19 -0400 Robert Huff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > James writes: > > > Add yourself to wheel (which is the root group on FreeBSD, a name > > I believe it inherited from earlier BSDs, but I've no idea what > > the justification for choosing 'wheel' is; any BSD historians > > here - you'd be welcome to let us know!) > > Not sure, but I believe "wheel" predates UNIX. I have > certainly seen the idea on OSes that do. Interesting. Google found this: From "The New Hacker's Dictionary version 4.2.2" by Various editors wheel n. [from slang `big wheel' for a powerful person] A person who has an active wheel bit. "We need to find a wheel to unwedge the hung tape drives." The traditional name of security group zero in BSD (to which the major system-internal users like root belong) is `wheel'. Some vendors have expanded on this usage, modifying Unix so that only members of group `wheel' can go root. -- Thanks, John. _______________________________________________ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to "[EMAIL PROTECTED]"
