Xfce GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.ConsoleKit.Manager.Error.InsufficientPermission: Not Authorized

[Geezer]

Running xfce4 from lightdm.
Since upgrading all the ports, and xfce going from 4.18 to 4.20, I now get this persistent error message on the desktop.

Power Manager
GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.ConsoleKit.Manager.Error.InsufficientPermission: Not Authorized

Dunno what it is all about, but I would like to get rid of it.

 

[SirDice]

Is DBus itself running? sysrc dbus_enable="YES" and service dbus start. Another (related) issue might be ConsoleKit (or whatever it's called nowadays). Within XFCE. open a terminal and enter ck-list-sessions, it should show some information, similar to this:

dice@williscorto:~ % ck-list-sessions
Session1:
        unix-user = '1001'
        realname = 'SirDice'
        seat = 'seat0'
        session-type = 'x11'
        session-class = 'user'
        session-state = 'active'
        session-service = 'unspecified'
        active = TRUE
        x11-display = ':0.0'
        x11-display-device = '/dev/ttyv8'
        display-device = ''
        remote-host-name = ''
        is-local = TRUE
        on-since = '2024-12-25T18:39:44.736409Z'
        login-session-id = ''
        XDG_RUNTIME_DIR = '/var/run/user/1001'
        VTNr = '9'

It's been a while since I last used XFCE but if I remember correctly the power manager required some additional permissions, I think it was configured by default for the operator group. But I'm not entirely sure if that's still the case. Easy enough to try; pw groupmod operator -m <user> to add your user account to the operator group.

 

[Geezer]

Is DBus itself running? ...

service dbus status
dbus is running as pid 2693.

ck-list-sessions

	unix-user = '1000'
	realname = 'Geezer'
	seat = 'seat0'
	session-type = 'unspecified'
	session-class = 'user'
	session-state = 'online'
	session-service = 'unspecified'
	active = FALSE
	x11-display = ':0'
	x11-display-device = '/dev/ttyv8'
	display-device = '/dev/   ?   '
	remote-host-name = ''
	is-local = TRUE
	on-since = '2025-01-07T05:37:39.919788Z'
	login-session-id = ''
	XDG_RUNTIME_DIR = '/var/run/user/1000'
	VTNr = '9'

grep operator /etc/group
operator:*:5:root,geezer

 

[Geezer]

SirDice

Thank you for the thumbs up. I think I have done every thing right. But I am still getting this error.

I have even turned notifications off for the Power Manager, but it seems to get tuned back on automatically.

Is this time for a PR?

 

[SirDice]

Oh, I see some things have changed, check out the pkg-message of x11-wm/xfce4-session:

# pkg info -D xfce4-session
xfce4-session-4.18.4:
On install:
To be able to shutdown or reboot your system, you'll have to add .rules
files in /usr/local/etc/polkit-1/rules.d directory. Which looks
like this (replace PUTYOURGROUPHERE by your group):

polkit.addRule(function (action, subject) {
  if ((action.id == "org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.restart" ||
      action.id == "org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.stop")
      && subject.isInGroup("PUTYOURGROUPHERE")) {
    return polkit.Result.YES;
  }
});

For those who have working suspend/resume:

polkit.addRule(function (action, subject) {
  if (action.id == "org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.suspend"
      && subject.isInGroup("PUTYOURGROUPHERE")) {
    return polkit.Result.YES;
  }
});
{ there's more but not relevant right now }

I think you might need to add another rule, specifically for power-manager, then use the operator group for PUTYOURGROUPHERE. Although I have no idea which action.id the power-manager uses.

ConsoleKit/PolicyKit acts like a gatekeeper, you can use this to selectively allow users to modify certain (desktop) settings or lock them down. I suspect there's simply no 'default' rule that allows using the power-manager by any 'regular' user.

 

[freethread]

I have not followed the pkg message. I entirely skipped it (my mistake), but I can suspend/restart/turn-off/change user. In my /usr/local/etc/polkit-1/rules.d directory I have only one file: 50-default.rules (the date is 2024.10.17, probably when it was installed). The content is:

/* -*- mode: js; js-indent-level: 4; indent-tabs-mode: nil -*- */

// DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE, it will be overwritten on update
//
// Default rules for polkit
//
// See the polkit(8) man page for more information
// about configuring polkit.

polkit.addAdminRule(function(action, subject) {
    return ["unix-group:wheel"];
});

I never changed it, it was installed by x11-wm/xfce4 version 4.18, upgraded to 4.20

 

[Geezer]

I have not followed the pkg message. I entirely skipped it (my mistake), but I can suspend/restart/turn-off/change user. In my /usr/local/etc/polkit-1/rules.d directory I have only one file: 50-default.rules (the date is 2024.10.17, probably when it was installed).

Yes, I have got that as well.

In the meantime, I have been running xfce4-power-manager --debug and watching the trace.

Coinciding with the error notifications I get:

(xfce4-power-manager:85535): xfce4-power-manager-WARNING **: 23:26:12.526: Failed to suspend via ConsoleKit: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.ConsoleKit.Manager.Error.InsufficientPermission: Not Authorized
TRACE[xfpm-suspend.c:201] xfpm_suspend_try_action(): Executing command: pkexec /usr/local/sbin/xfce4-pm-helper --suspend
==== AUTHENTICATING FOR org.xfce.power.xfce4-pm-helper ====
Authentication is required to place the system in suspend or hibernate mode
Authenticating as: Geezer (geezer)

** (process:97035): WARNING **: 23:26:12.540: Error reading line from helper: nothing to read
==== AUTHENTICATION FAILED ====

It is trying to suspend - which I really do not want - it is a desktop workstation and server. Can't find anywhere to turn this off.

In the meantime, I have ln -s /usr/bin/true /usr/local/sbin/xfce4-pm-helper which is a really horrible kludge. (Didn't work anyway.)