[systemd-devel] systemctl as root prompting for username

[Mantas Mikulėnas]

On Sun, Apr 13, 2025, 22:35 Ian Pilcher <arequipeno at gmail.com> wrote:

> I have never seen this before.  After some recent update, systemctl is
> now prompting for a username when I try to start/stop/restart a unit as
> root.
>
>    # whoami
>    root
>    [root at ampersand systemd]# systemctl restart httpd
>    🔐 Enter Auth Username:
>
> (It does work when I enter 'root' at the prompt.)
>
> This is systemd-256.12-1.fc41.x86_64.
>
> Anyone have any idea what could cause this?


It looks like a `systemd-ask-password` prompt, with the text coming from
OpenVPN. Those are displayed by a handler (systemd-tty-ask-password-agent)
spawned by systemctl while it is waiting for the service to start – either
OpenVPN happens to be starting at the same time as httpd, or it's a stale
request from earlier.
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