Switching between client and access mode

[mhfowler]

While writing the setup documentation I was testing this out,
I was able to switch between client and access mode using systemctl (worked great!),
but I wasn't able to switch modes using the physical interface or the web interface,
I didn't really poke around as the cause,

but curious if these are working for you @mycognosist with the latest peach code?

[mycognosist]

@mhfowler

Good catch! I've found the source of the problem in the systemd log:

Mar 18 20:15:51 peach systemd[1]: Started Query and configure network interfaces using JSON-RPC over HTTP..
Mar 18 20:21:24 peach sudo[412]: pam_unix(sudo:auth): conversation failed
Mar 18 20:21:24 peach sudo[412]: pam_unix(sudo:auth): auth could not identify password for [peach-network]
Mar 18 20:21:24 peach sudo[412]: peach-network : user NOT in sudoers ; TTY=unknown ; PWD=/ ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/systemctl start [email protected]

A bit of explanation:

The activate_ap() and activate_client() functions in peach-network simply start the required service via a command call to systemd. For example, sudo systemctl start [email protected]. Under the previous configuration, a rule was created in /etc/sudoers.d/ to allow the peach-network user to run the sudo command without needing to provide a password (we do a similar thing with /etc/sudoers.d/shutdown - configured by peach-config - to allow reboot and shutdown from peach-menu). Since that sudoers rule file is not there any more, we're receiving these errors.

Now that we're running peach-network as a member of the netdev group, I believe it might be possible to successfully execute the systemctl start command without sudo. I was in the process of testing this assumption but I broke my sudoers config and will need to reflash my system (doh!). A good reminder to use visudo for these purposes and not recklessly copy files XD

I'll comment again here once I've tested. Hopefully the netdev membership is sufficient and I can simply update the relevant functions in peach-network to remove sudo from the command. Otherwise, I'll create the necessary sudoers file for the command and submit a PR to peach-config.