The professionals at our local energy provider chopped a tree down because it was overhanging powerlines, and it of course fell the wrong way and killed my grid. So by the time I wake up, my backup power is gone and my network is down.
Turns out sometime (perhaps on some security bender) I changed my root password and don't remember it. Samba isn't set to start on boot (grr) and I can't start it without root access.
Now I need to update my server anyway, and I've got FC4 sitting here: what's the least-painful way of setting a new root password with complete physical access to the server? Would running a 'minimal' FC4 install allow me to set a new root password?
Don't forget your root password!
Moderator: Thanas
Don't forget your root password!
-
Faram
- Bastard Operator from Hell
- Posts: 5271
- Joined: 2002-07-04 07:39am
- Location: Fighting Polarbears
What OS do you have?
[img=right]http://hem.bredband.net/b217293/warsaban.gif[/img]
"Either God wants to abolish evil, and cannot; or he can, but does not want to. ... If he wants to, but cannot, he is impotent. If he can, but does not want to, he is wicked. ... If, as they say, God can abolish evil, and God really wants to do it, why is there evil in the world?" -Epicurus
Fear is the mother of all gods.
Nature does all things spontaneously, by herself, without the meddling of the gods. -Lucretius
"Either God wants to abolish evil, and cannot; or he can, but does not want to. ... If he wants to, but cannot, he is impotent. If he can, but does not want to, he is wicked. ... If, as they say, God can abolish evil, and God really wants to do it, why is there evil in the world?" -Epicurus
Fear is the mother of all gods.
Nature does all things spontaneously, by herself, without the meddling of the gods. -Lucretius
Don't you still need the password to login to single user (Fedora may be different though- I'm using Debian)?
I'd suggest using a bootdisk (Knoppix), and try chrooting to the filesystem "chroot /mnt/√" (I'm assuming you have everything under one partition, or at least /bin, /sbin, and /etc), and running "passwd" from there.
If you can't figure out how to do that, depending on whether PAM is set to allow null passwords, you can edit /etc/shadow- change the first line from
to
(Note: numbers may be different)
and try rebooting and logging in normally w/ a blank password
Obviously you have to be root on the instance of Linux on the bootdisk to do the stuff listed above.
I'd suggest using a bootdisk (Knoppix), and try chrooting to the filesystem "chroot /mnt/√" (I'm assuming you have everything under one partition, or at least /bin, /sbin, and /etc), and running "passwd" from there.
If you can't figure out how to do that, depending on whether PAM is set to allow null passwords, you can edit /etc/shadow- change the first line from
Code: Select all
root:[some gibberish between the two colons]:12988:0:99999:7:::
Code: Select all
root::12988:0:99999:7:::
and try rebooting and logging in normally w/ a blank password
Obviously you have to be root on the instance of Linux on the bootdisk to do the stuff listed above.
ah.....the path to happiness is revision of dreams and not fulfillment... -SWPIGWANG
Sufficient Googling is indistinguishable from knowledge -somebody
Anything worth the cost of a missile, which can be located on the battlefield, will be shot at with missiles. If the US military is involved, then things, which are not worth the cost if a missile will also be shot at with missiles. -Sea Skimmer
George Bush makes freedom sound like a giant robot that breaks down a lot. -Darth Raptor
-
Darth Yoshi
- Metroid
- Posts: 7342
- Joined: 2002-07-04 10:00pm
- Location: Seattle
- Contact:
Well, for Redhat, anyway, single-user doesn't require a password.
Lore Monkey | the Pichu-master™
Secularism—since AD 80
Av: Elika; Prince of Persia