How to Execute Python Script Using pkexec

Question

For a project I am writing a PyQt5 widget for ifconfig on Linux. Some parts of my code require admin privilege. For example, shutting down an interface.

This is a GUI application and users must enter their sudo password using a GUI. I have searched online and found pkexec that allows an authorized user to execute program as another user. So, I wrote the .policy action file required. I have never used polkit before, I might have missed something.

I can execute my program with no errors using python3 ifconfig_Logic.py

but if I try executing my program using pkexec python3 ~/Desktop/GUI/ifconfig_Logic.py The message on the authentication window is

Shouldn't the message be Authentication is required to run the ifconfigLogic instead of Authentication is required to install this project ?

Also, I get the following error

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/grandino/Desktop/GUI/ifconfig_Logic.py", line 9, in <module>
    baseUIClass, baseUIWidget = uic.loadUiType("ifconfig.ui")
  File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/PyQt5/uic/__init__.py", line 199, in loadUiType
    winfo = compiler.UICompiler().compileUi(uifile, code_string, from_imports,
  File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/PyQt5/uic/Compiler/compiler.py", line 111, in compileUi
    w = self.parse(input_stream, resource_suffix)
  File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/PyQt5/uic/uiparser.py", line 1020, in parse
    document = parse(filename)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.8/xml/etree/ElementTree.py", line 1202, in parse
    tree.parse(source, parser)
  File "/usr/lib/python3.8/xml/etree/ElementTree.py", line 584, in parse
    source = open(source, "rb")
FileNotFoundError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: 'ifconfig.ui'

ifconfig.ui is the ui file that ifconfig_Logic.py uses to import the interface. I thought this issue is beacase ifconfig.ui is not added in the policy so I added it.

Here is ifconfig_Logic.py

from PyQt5 import QtCore, QtGui, QtWidgets, QtWidgets
from PyQt5.QtCore import pyqtSignal, pyqtSlot, QObject, QProcess, Qt
from PyQt5 import uic
from PyQt5 import QtGui


import sys

baseUIClass, baseUIWidget = uic.loadUiType("ifconfig.ui")

class ifconfig_Logic(baseUIWidget,baseUIClass):
    process = QProcess()
    send_output = pyqtSignal(str)


    def __init__(self, parent = None):
        super(ifconfig_Logic,self).__init__(parent)
        self.setupUi(self)
        self.setWindowFlags(QtCore.Qt.WindowCloseButtonHint | QtCore.Qt.WindowMinimizeButtonHint)






if __name__ == '__main__':
    app = QtWidgets.QApplication(sys.argv)
    ui = ifconfig_Logic(None)

    ui.show()

    sys.exit(app.exec_())

Policy file

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE policyconfig PUBLIC
 "-//freedesktop//DTD PolicyKit Policy Configuration 1.0//EN"
 "http://www.freedesktop.org/standards/PolicyKit/1/policyconfig.dtd">
<policyconfig>



  <action id="com.ifconfigLogic">
    <description>Run ifconfigLogic</description>
   
    <message>Authentication is required to run the ifconfigLogic</message>
   
    <defaults>
      <allow_any>auth_admin_keep</allow_any>
      <allow_inactive>auth_admin_keep</allow_inactive>
      <allow_active>auth_admin_keep</allow_active>
    </defaults>
    
     <annotate key="org.freedesktop.policykit.exec.path">/home/grandino/Desktop/GUI/ifconfig</annotate>
    <annotate key="org.freedesktop.policykit.exec.allow_gui">true</annotate>
  </action>

</policyconfig>

How can I fix this issue? Why do files seem missing when I use pkexec ?

Answer 1

It is recommended that you build the absolute paths instead of using relative paths.

import os.path

CURRENT_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(__file__))
ui_filename = os.path.join(CURRENT_DIR, "ifconfig.ui")

baseUIClass, baseUIWidget = uic.loadUiType(ui_filename)