Two ways to use sudo command for a standard user account:
First,
If you want to use sudo command for a standard user account, then you need to add this account to /etc/sudoers file. Use the following steps to add your desired user account to /etc/sudoers file:
- login as administration : i.e. su – adminuser
- type sudo visudo
- Find out the following
# User privilege specification
root ALL=(ALL) ALL
%admin ALL=(ALL) ALL
- Add your user account below “root ALL=(ALL) ALL”. For example:
# User privilege specification
root ALL=(ALL) ALL
yourusername ALL=(ALL) ALL
%admin ALL=(ALL) ALL
- Save your file (:wq), and now you will be able to use sudo command for your username.
Second(Recommended),
Just add the user to the sudo group:
sudo adduser <username> sudo
The change will take effect the next time the user logs in.
This works because /etc/sudoers is pre-configured to grant permissions to all members of this group (You should not have to make any changes to this):
# Allow members of group sudo to execute any command
%sudo ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL
As long as you have access to a user that is in the same groups as your "original" user, you can delete the old one.
Realistically, there are also other groups your new user should be a member of. If you set the Account type of a user to Administrator in Users Settings, it will be placed in at least all of these groups:
adm sudo lpadmin sambashare
Because your system configuration may vary, I suggest taking a look at the output of groups <username> to see what groups are normally in use.