[solved] sudo command in a Bash function?

Question

Hello there,
I need to use sudo inside of a Bash function in order to allow my laptop to hibernate after a certain time using "systemctl hibernate".
However, I cannot figure out what's the correct way to include sudo inside of my function snippet:
function hibernate {
echo "System is going to hibernate in $1 minute(s)..."
sleep $1m ; systemctl hibernate
alias hibernate_timer=sudo hibernate # sudo misplaced here
Last edited by orschiro (2013-06-26 20:33:47)

Answer 1

you'd need sudo's -E parameter for that, otherwise that function is not defined in the su environment.
EDIT: -E is not sufficient.
man sudoers wrote:In all cases, environment variables with a value beginning with () are
     removed as they could be interpreted as bash functions.  The list of environ‐
     ment variables that sudo allows or denies is contained in the output of “sudo
     -V” when run as root.
You cannot pass functions to sudo - the alias is not relevant, you couldn't do this directly: `sudo hibernate` would fail.
I'd also recommend putting the sudo as "deep" as possible: right on the systemctl command.  There is a reason bash functions are not allowed to be 'sudo'ed - and running sudo on a function that includes a sleep command seem particularly bad to me.
Last edited by Trilby (2013-06-26 17:59:18)