The problem with that system is it that its not usually a good idea to automatically remember the root permission password. So what Fedora developers wanted to do instead was to rework the permission setup such that users would be assigned roles based on what they need to do with a system and the type of system in use.

"The idea was that the change in PolicyKit would be accompanied by a default set of roles, and a nice user interface for assigning users to roles," Taylor wrote. "Unfortunately, with the constraints of time, it became clear that this all (and especially the GUI) wasn't going to be there for Fedora 12. So, PackageKit needed a fixed policy for all users."

The fixed policy that Fedora went with was to allow all users to install signed packages from the Fedora repositories.

In my own personal case, I'm running Fedora 12 on a single-user system so this is something that works for me. Yeaah I know, we should have a separation of root and user. But really all that means is just entering SUDO/pswrd doesn't it? Since the only allowed packages that non-root could install were signed packages from the Fedora repository, what is the risk?

In any event, Fedora 12 is now going back to its historical behavior, so no harm done.

Fedora listens to its community and it responds quickly. Unlike a proprietary software vendor where you'd wait weeks for such a patch, Fedora users get their changes extremely rapidly.