How do I change my user permissions to edit /etc/apt/sources.list?

Question

I need to alter sources.list I am able to make the changes but it will not save, keeps saying I don't have the permissions to do that.

Solution 1

You need root privileges to edit that file. Open the file from a terminal and type "sudo" in front of your editor of choice. More on sudo: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudo

For example:

sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list

Nano is a fairly simple editor. See this question How to edit files in a terminal with nano? if you want to know more on how to use it.

Solution 2

You can use gedit as your text editor, which is the default text editor on Ubuntu 11.10 and edit the /etc/apt/sources.list file by running this command:

gksudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

What this does is it opens the file with root privileges using gedit, which is your default text editor.

Comments

[Knowledge Cube]

Welcome to Ask Ubuntu! What program/utility are you using to edit sources.list?

[david6]

It would be much safer to edit using Ubuntu Tweak (my preferred) or Ubuntu Software Center.

[red.clover]

gksu please. unix.stackexchange.com/questions/2958/…

[user85343]

Thank you. So is it gksudo or gksu?

[red.clover]

In Ubuntu, those are actually the same thing: askubuntu.com/questions/21033/…