Sudo and su are two powerful utilities on linux operating system that enables one to manipulate who is performing actions on the filesystem and with which privileges .
The main difference between those two tools is that if administrator uses su - username then he should provide the user password in order to switch to the end user rights. On the other hand with sudo command the administrator should use its own password in order to validate with the system that he wants to run as a superuser the command su - .
As a result by using sudo su - x you dont have to specify the end user password but your own password.
Another way you can authorize your self as superuser is with sudo -i so you do not have to provide the password of root in the system.
The sudo command is very powerful and useful in the linux systems because for security purposes many times you could find root user deactivated and each user has its own credentials and rights. Also actions performed with sudo commands are logged in the operating system.
The most important prerequisite in order to use sudo command in Red Hat or Centos Linux is to be a member of the wheel group. You can give a specific user sudo rights with the following:
Create a new file under /etc/sudoers.d/USERNAME
touch /etc/sudoers.d/operator
and then vi the operator file and add the following line:
operator ALL=(ALL) ALL
