which begs the question for a totally newbie, how do I become root?

install rootsh then you should simply be able to type "root" in a terminal and you are in as the root user. execute the command so make the file executable and type exit and you will be back as user "user".

you can just cut and paste the text from the above post into a textfile using nano or vi. of course you will need ssh server installed and running on the n900 to do that...always another hoop....

I only know vi on this device but I am sure there is an easy text editor so that you can just input those few lines into each file...then make it then executable, again this will all be done as root.