How do I open a non-readable file from inside emacs when I opened emacs as a regular user?

Question

The question pretty much says it all. I opened emacs as a regular user and am trying to edit something in the /etc/ folder (I know this is dangerous etc. etc.)

How can I do this?

Answer 1

You could use https://stackoverflow.com/questions/95631/open-a-file-with-su-sudo-inside-emacs, for example C-x C-f /sudo::/path/to/file

Answer 2

There is packages that gives some utilities functions for this:

• sudo-edit for opening buffers as root
• dired-toggle-sudo for switching from current user to sudo when browsind dired buffers.

Also see the Edit file with super-user rights question.