pastim's questions

I've read a lot of threads about gksu being removed from many Linux flavours, including Ubuntu 18.04. Many state that gksu is an abomination and no user should ever need to use anything like it. I have 2 examples where, as far as I know, I must have something that allows me to run as root (not just for editing files).

First, I have a need to start mysql only after an encrypted folder is opened on (GUI) command. This means having a script run by the encryption system that starts the mysql service. That has to be done as root, so I use gksu in that startup script which asks me for a password. How else can I start a service from a GUI system?

I also run Ubuntu system backups as root, otherwise many system files can't be backed up. So the desktop file uses gksu to start the backup.

pkexec looks complicated, needing policy files. Is that the only alternative, and if so, why is it any safer?

Other answers to similar questions don't seem to address individual issues that people have now that gksu is no more (or harder to find...). I think such questions from non-expert users would benefit from more detailed answers. I now have some, and so would like to answer my own question.

Since I updated to 17.10 Gnome, for several slow applications ubuntu keeps asking if I want to wait or force quit. This is irritating and gets in the way, so I want to change the timeout. On a much slower laptop running xubuntu (xfce) 17.10 I do not have this problem.

Elsewhere (How to increase waiting time for non responding programs?) it was suggested that I'd have to edit the mutter app since it has a hard-coded timeout.

Is this really the only way to change this timeout? I did make one attempt but the compilation came unstuck with an incompatible version of automake, and I don't really want to have to change the application anyway.

The applications that tend to do this are opening very large and complex spreadsheets in Libreoffice calc, and opening some complex forms in a remote database in Libreoffice Base.