Why do all of the commands require root?

[scizzorz]

It seems like it's working entirely in ~/.rootbox - why does every command tell me I need to run it as root?

[refi64]

Well, technically it isn't all of them... ;)

The reason is that Rootbox three root-only features:

• Loop mounts, which are used to mount images and boxes.
• chroots, which create the isolated environment that Rootbox uses.
• Bind mounts, which are used to expose certain directories into the chroots.

There are non-root alternatives to each one here (fuseext2, schroot, and bindfs, respectively), but they all come with some restrictions:

• fuseext2 states, "do not mount your filesystems with write support unless you don't have anything to lose." Rootbox basically relies on being able to mount with write support...
• schroot is mostly a Debian-only feature and requires editing a global configuration file.
• bindfs is slow.

So...it ends up being a lose-lose scenario.

[scizzorz]

Interesting - thanks for the response. I really enjoy the idea, but requiring root is impossible for me in some environments.

[refi64]

@scizzorz

requiring root is impossible for me in some environments

Do you have some examples?

[scizzorz]

Well, mostly just environments where I don't have root access 😉

I was hoping to be able to use rootbox as a system-level virtualenv a la Python, but on several systems I simply don't have root access, so this is unusable.

[refi64]

Actually, you got me thinking and I've done some more research, and this might actually be possible...

[refi64]

@scizzorz As a side note: what exactly are the environments where root access is unavailable like?

[scizzorz]

I'm not entirely sure I understand your question. Can you elaborate a bit?

[refi64]

I'm mostly asking why it is the environments don't have root access. Is it a CI server or online development tool or...?

[scizzorz]

Some class / lab machines at a university, compute nodes in various types of clusters, VMs at work, etc - they're all machines that I have an account on, but I am not the administrator or owner.