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Just recently installed Ubuntu 20.04.1 LTS replacing entirely Windows 10. I set up everything the way I wanted and I also installed Timeshift and made a backup successfully.

I tried to go into Timeshift today and it requested my password to login, so I put the one and only password I have, which is the same password I log into Ubuntu with. The password is not accepted.

I assumed it was because I wasn't a root user so I tried to become one using sudo -i and sudo -s (I read that here) and I got a Password prompt and here, again, I inputted the one and only password I have which is the same one I use to log into Ubuntu.

That's when I got the message "user is not in the sudoers file. this incident will be reported".

So I investigated the problem and tried this link https://www.tecmint.com/fix-user-is-not-in-the-sudoers-file-the-incident-will-be-reported-ubuntu/.

All seemed to have gone well with no problems or errors and I've also found the same information in multiple websites but the problem still persists.

Does anybody have any ideas as to what else I can try? I don't care about being root in general, I just want to be able to open my apps like Timeshift and my Firewall app.

Any help much appreciated.

Note: I am entirely new to Ubuntu so forgive me if I haven't performed some basic actions. Also, the website brings this question as suggested but does not help my situation. Most questions I came across containing the specific error message are solved by running some simple commands such as sudo -i and sudo -s but in my case that approach is not sufficient.

Nikos
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  • It has the solution but it doesn’t mention the actual error message I got about the user not being in the sudoers file so I probably wouldn’t have found it as I was searching specifically for that error. Nevertheless, it does contain the same solution. Thanks for that. – Nikos Jan 02 '21 at 07:46
  • Sorry just a quick question. Why is this question considered a duplicate with the provided question in the link? One question asks about what to do when a specific error message is presented and the other question asks about what specific actions are required to add a user to the sudo group. Different question, same solution. Why is the question considered a duplicate? – Nikos Jan 02 '21 at 13:52

1 Answers1

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OK, so I tried again, this time instead of trying to act with a sudo role, I simply had to re-add myself to the sudo group. I'm still not sure how I was removed though.

The solution for this was simply to add my user to the sudo group using #adduser username sudo.

So, if you ever get the message “user is not in the sudoers file. this incident will be reported” do check if you are in the sudo group first before attempting commands like sudo -i and sudo -s.

Full instructions and steps here.

Nikos
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