Underline OS Config via Browser

What is the best way programmatically to configure a Linux OS and applications via browser?

Do you have the web server via php scripts write directly to the config files with root privileges or do you have another process/task running in elevated privileges do the work for the web server.

How do the network appliance box programmers do it?

Note that the web app would be the only one running on the box not a multi host scenario.

This screams of security problems.

I think you usually have a special web server that runs as root, or some setuid perl script (I think that's how webmin does it).


ober: it does, but it's very common. You just have to harden this way into the computer.