Elasticsearch 6.2.2 not able to run as root user

[tushar_raut]

I have downloaded the tar file elasticsearch-6.2.2.tar.gz and trying to run /bin/elasticsearch but it giving me error as following :

[root@tushar-nginx elasticsearch-6.2.2]# bin/elasticsearch
[2018-02-27T17:14:42,298][WARN ][o.e.b.ElasticsearchUncaughtExceptionHandler] [] uncaught exception in thread [main]
org.elasticsearch.bootstrap.StartupException: java.lang.RuntimeException: can not run elasticsearch as root
at org.elasticsearch.bootstrap.Elasticsearch.init(Elasticsearch.java:125) ~[elasticsearch-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
at org.elasticsearch.bootstrap.Elasticsearch.execute(Elasticsearch.java:112) ~[elasticsearch-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
at org.elasticsearch.cli.EnvironmentAwareCommand.execute(EnvironmentAwareCommand.java:86) ~[elasticsearch-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
at org.elasticsearch.cli.Command.mainWithoutErrorHandling(Command.java:124) ~[elasticsearch-cli-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
at org.elasticsearch.cli.Command.main(Command.java:90) ~[elasticsearch-cli-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
at org.elasticsearch.bootstrap.Elasticsearch.main(Elasticsearch.java:92) ~[elasticsearch-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
at org.elasticsearch.bootstrap.Elasticsearch.main(Elasticsearch.java:85) ~[elasticsearch-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
Caused by: java.lang.RuntimeException: can not run elasticsearch as root
at org.elasticsearch.bootstrap.Bootstrap.initializeNatives(Bootstrap.java:105) ~[elasticsearch-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
at org.elasticsearch.bootstrap.Bootstrap.setup(Bootstrap.java:172) ~[elasticsearch-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
at org.elasticsearch.bootstrap.Bootstrap.init(Bootstrap.java:323) ~[elasticsearch-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
at org.elasticsearch.bootstrap.Elasticsearch.init(Elasticsearch.java:121) ~[elasticsearch-6.2.2.jar:6.2.2]
... 6 more

Is this is the bug?
I have checked error on google and found that same issue was there in elastic search 5.x .

[Christian_Dahlqvist]

You should not be running Elasticsearch as root, and the Elasticsearch bootstrap checks now validate this and throws an exception. This is entirely intentional and not a bug. You can read more around the background to why the bootstrap checks were introduced here.

[tushar_raut]

Understood, Thanks Christian.