A bit of a resolution to my question above: If you put this line into the sudoers file, you can use sudo inside shell scripts. You can also run the shell scripts outside of xterm (for example as desktop menu items):

user ALL = NOPASSWD: ALL

BTW: I made this addition to the sudoers file on my windows PC via the dropbear SSH server (WinSCP on the PC).

I was also able to open and view the sudoers file on the 770 with joe, but I didn't change anything for fear of screwing up the 770.