Creating a Non-root User
For a simple setup process, Local Desktop won't prompt for a user registration form, that's why it is login as root by default.
However, some applications are recommended or required to run as a normal user. For example:
- Chrome and Electron-based applications like VS Code work better or are safer without root.
- AUR helpers like Paru or Yay require a non-root user and won't work as root.
Please follow the instructions below carefully, or you can continue to use XFCE with root if you prefer.
Create your user
Open a terminal and run the following command:
(Replace teddy with your preferred username)
useradd -m teddy
The -m flag creates a home directory for the user.
Create your password
Set a password for your new user (you'll need this for sudo):
passwd teddy
Set up sudo
Once you have logged in as a non-root user, you must use sudo to run commands with root privileges. If you skip this step, you won't be able to install new packages.
Install sudo:
pacman -S sudo
Allow your user to use sudo by editing the sudoers file:
EDITOR=nano visudo
Append a new line:
teddy ALL=(ALL) ALL
(Replace teddy with the username you created previously)
Save and exit.
You can test if your new user can use sudo by temporarily logging in:
su teddy # Change to your username
sudo ls /root # Make sure it does not output something like: "teddy is not in the sudoers file"
[Important] Tell Local Desktop
You must tell Local Desktop who to log in as, or it will log in as root. To (create and) edit the config file:
nano /etc/localdesktop/localdesktop.toml
Add the following content:
[user]
username = "teddy"
(Replace teddy with the username you created previously)
The changes will take effect the next time you launch Local Desktop. If something goes wrong, you can always delete this config file and restart as root.