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https://github.com/intgr/ego

Alter Ego: run Linux desktop applications under a different local user
https://github.com/intgr/ego

isolation linux linux-desktop-applications pulseaudio sandboxing wayland xhost

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Alter Ego: run Linux desktop applications under a different local user

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README 

        
ego (a.k.a Alter Ego)

=====================



[![Crates.io version](https://img.shields.io/crates/v/ego.svg)](https://crates.io/crates/ego)

[![Tests status](https://github.com/intgr/ego/workflows/Tests/badge.svg?branch=master)](https://github.com/intgr/ego/actions?query=workflow:Tests)



> Do all your games need access to your documents, browser history, SSH private keys?

>

> ... No? Just run `ego steam`!



**Ego** is a tool to run Linux desktop applications under a different local user. Currently

integrates with Wayland, Xorg, PulseAudio and xdg-desktop-portal. You may think of it as `xhost`

for Wayland and PulseAudio. This is done using filesystem ACLs and X11 host access control.



Disclaimer: **DO NOT RUN UNTRUSTED PROGRAMS VIA EGO.** However, using ego is more secure than

running applications directly under your primary user.



Distro packages

---------------

Distribution packages are available for:

* Arch Linux (user-contributed package) https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/ego/



After installing the package, add yourself to the `ego-users` group. After logout and login,

the `ego` command should just work.



([varia/README.md](varia/README.md) documents recommendations for distro packagers)



Manual setup

------------

Ego aims to come with sane defaults and be easy to set up.



**Requirements:**

* [Rust & cargo](https://www.rust-lang.org/tools/install)

* `libacl.so` library (Debian/Ubuntu: libacl1-dev; Fedora: libacl-devel; Arch: acl)

* `libxcb.so` library (Debian/Ubuntu: libxcb1-dev; Fedora: libxcb-devel; Arch: libxcb)



**Recommended:** (Not needed when using `--sudo` mode, but some desktop functionality may not work).

* `machinectl` command (Debian/Ubuntu/Fedora: systemd-container; Arch: systemd)

* `xdg-desktop-portal-gtk` (Debian/Ubuntu/Fedora/Arch: xdg-desktop-portal-gtk)



**Installation:**



1. Run:



       cargo install ego

       sudo cp ~/.cargo/bin/ego /usr/local/bin/



2. Create local user named "ego": [1]



       sudo useradd ego --uid 155 --create-home



3. That's all, try it:



       ego xdg-open .



[1] No extra groups are needed by the ego user.

UID below 1000 hides this user on the login screen.



### Avoid password prompt

If using "machinectl" mode (default if available), you need the rather new systemd version >=247

and polkit >=0.106 to do this securely.



Create file `/etc/polkit-1/rules.d/50-ego-machinectl.rules`, polkit will automatically load it

(replace `` with your own username):



```js

polkit.addRule(function(action, subject) {

    if (action.id == "org.freedesktop.machine1.host-shell" &&

        action.lookup("user") == "ego" &&

        subject.user == "") {

            return polkit.Result.YES;

    }

});

```



##### sudo mode

For sudo, add the following to `/etc/sudoers` (replace `` with your own username):



     ALL=(ego) NOPASSWD:ALL



Changelog

---------



##### Unreleased

* Use X11 protocol directly via `libxcb`. The `xhost` dependency is no longer needed. (#163)



##### 1.1.7 (2023-06-26)

* Distro packaging: added tmpfiles.d conf to create missing ego user home directory (#134, fixed issue #131)

* Ego now detects and warns when target user's home directory does not exist or has wrong ownership (#139)

* Minimum Supported Rust Version (MSRV) is now 1.64.0 (#116)

* Various minor cleanups, replaced unmaintained dependencies, dependency updates.



##### 1.1.6 (2023-01-21)

* Updated to clap 4.0.x (#101) and many other dependency updates

* Fixes for new clippy lints (#95, #93, #111)

* Use `snapbox` instead of hand-coded snapshot testing (#102)

* Minimum Supported Rust Version (MSRV) was determined to be 1.60.0 (#113)



##### 1.1.5 (2022-01-02)

* Document xhost requirement, improve xhost error reporting (#76)

* Upgrade to clap 3.0.0 stable (#71)



(Version 1.1.4 was yanked, it was accidentally released with a regression)



##### 1.1.3 (2021-11-12)

* Pin clap version (fixes #65) (#68)



##### 1.1.2 (2021-05-08)

* Enable sudo askpass helper if SUDO_ASKPASS is set (#58)

  * Example how to set up a GUI password prompt with sudo: https://askubuntu.com/a/314401

  * Note: For a GUI password prompt with the machinectl mode, you need to run a

    Polkit authentication agent instead



##### 1.1.1 (2021-03-23)

* Include drop-in files for polkit, sudoers.d, sysusers.d -- for distro packages (#53)

* Documentation tweaks (#51, #53)



##### 1.1.0 (2021-03-07)

* Default to `machinectl` if available, fall back to `sudo` otherwise (#47)

* Documentation & minor improvements (#46, #48)



##### 0.4.1 (2021-01-29)

* Fixed `--machinectl` on Ubuntu, Debian with dash shell (#42)

* Fixed error reporting when command execution fails (#43)

* Documented how to avoid password prompt with machinectl & other doc tweaks (#41)



##### 0.4.0 (2021-01-29)

* Improved integration with desktop environments:

  * Launch xdg-desktop-portal-gtk in machinectl session (#6, #31)

  * Old behavior is still available via `--machinectl-bare` switch.

* Shell completion files are now auto-generated with clap-generate 3.0.0-beta.2 (#36, #28)

  * bash, zsh and fish shells are supported out of the box.

* Code reorganization and CI improvements (#21, #23)

* Dependency updates (#20, #24, #27, #22, #26, #33, #35, #38, #37, #39)



##### 0.3.1 (2020-03-17)

* Improved error message for missing target user (#16)



##### 0.3.0 (2020-03-02)

* Initial machinectl support (using `--machinectl`) (#8)

* Updated: posix-acl (#9)



##### 0.2.0 (2020-02-17)

* Added zsh completion support (#5)

* Added `--verbose` flag (#4)

* Added `--user` argument and command-line parsing (#3)



##### 0.1.0 (2020-02-13)

Initial version



Appendix

--------

Ego is licensed under the MIT License (see the `LICENSE` file). Ego was created by Marti Raudsepp.

Ego's primary website is at https://github.com/intgr/ego



Thanks to Alexander Payne (myrrlyn) for relinquishing the unused "ego" crate name.