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Yester I asked this question, and tried to follow cl-netbox's advice:

Highlight the Ubuntu entry in the GRUB boot menu and press the E key. Add nouveau.modeset=0 to the end of the linux line - press F10 to boot. On login screen press Ctrl+Alt+F1 ... enter user name and password ... Now execute the commands ...

After pressing Ctrl+Alt+F1 at the login screen and writing sudo apt-get update, the laptop asks me for my password (as per usual). However, the password that I normally always use does not work. I've no idea what password I should use. Anybody can help me?

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    "does not work" - what happens exactly? what is the error message? Jan 7, 2016 at 14:35
  • That my password is not correct. @steeldriver
    – Hunter
    Jan 8, 2016 at 11:45

1 Answer 1

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When a nonprivileged user runs sudo <command>, he/she is asked for his/her password, not the root password. (It makes sense -- if the user knows the root password, he/she wouldn't need to use sudo.)

So, since all the user need is his/her password, does that mean that any user is allowed to run any command as root? Certainly not; which user can run which command as root, and other limitations, is all specified in the /etc/sudoers file.

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  • Thanks for your reply. I'm a bit confused by your answer, but I willing to learn. Do you know of any document where I can read more about this? Please note that I'm the only user on this laptop (which is my own laptop).
    – Hunter
    Jan 7, 2016 at 17:07
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    Here's a tutorial about sudo: linux.com/learn/tutorials/306766:linux-101-introduction-to-sudo . There are many other docs, I'd recommend that you google for "linux sudo tutorial" and read around a bit. Also, remember that you have manual pages on Linux which are the best reference you can get: just type "man sudo" as a shell command.
    – dr_
    Jan 8, 2016 at 8:20

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