sudo

Sudo (superuser do) allows a system administrator to give certain
users (or groups of users) the ability to run some (or all) commands
as root while logging all commands and arguments. Sudo operates on a
per-command basis.  It is not a replacement for the shell.  Features
include: the ability to restrict what commands a user may run on a
per-host basis, copious logging of each command (providing a clear
audit trail of who did what), a configurable timeout of the sudo
command, and the ability to use the same configuration file (sudoers)
on many different machines.