[NBLUG/talk] Lost Passwords

Ian Sutherland iansuth at fastmail.fm
Wed Mar 23 08:31:36 PST 2005


Thanks for the response. There is no "shadow" file in /mnt/hdd3/etc.

I checked the permissions for /home/ian; 

User 6058
Group dip

/home/ian1;

User 1001
Group sslwrap

Thanks, Ian

On Wed, 23 Mar 2005 01:10:19 -0800, "Andrew" <argonaut at softhome.net>
said:
> Ian Sutherland wrote on Tue, 22 Mar 2005 22:30:14 -0800:
> 
> > Whatever I did, none of the passwords, root, users, work at
> > login of Debian sarge.
> [snip]
> > I tried accessing /etc/passwd from Knoppix to install a new
> > user but it's read only.
> [snip]
> 
> Remember, Knoppix bends over backwards to make sure you don't
> accidentally screw up the data on your hard disk. This includes
> mounting hard disk partitions read-only unless you specifically
> choose to mount them read-write. So, boot up Knoppix, right-click
> the icon representing your root partition and select "Mount".
> Then right-click the icon again and select Actions -> Change
> read/write mode. Now you're free to write changes to the
> partition.
> 
> Next, fire up a terminal and use your favorite text editor to
> edit the /etc/shadow file on your hard disk (that's where your
> encrypted passwords should be). Keep in mind, though, that this
> file is readable/writeable only to root, so you must use "sudo"
> in Knoppix to temporarily be root. First, make a copy of the file
> with this command (change the mount point as necessary):
> 
> sudo cp /mnt/hda1/etc/shadow /mnt/hda1/etc/shadow.bak
> 
> Now, you can edit the shadow file with your favorite editor, like
> this (if vi is your thing):
> 
> sudo vi /mnt/hda1/etc/shadow
> 
> Go to the line beginning with "root" and delete the entire mess
> of characters in the second colon-delimited field. Now the first
> and second colons should be immediately adjacent to each other,
> with no spaces between them at all. Write the file back to disk,
> shut down Knoppix, and start up your Debian system. You should
> now be able to log in as root without a password. Obviously, a
> passwordless root is a Very Bad Thing, so your system should be
> disconnected from the network for this entire procedure. Set a
> new root password now. Then, still as root, set new passwords for
> your other users.
> 
> And finally, stay away from olvwm. It may be a decent window
> manager, but obviously something ain't right with that package.
> Good luck!
> 
> A.
> 
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-- 
Ian Sutherland
2 Varda Street
Rohnert Park, CA 94928
iansuth at fastmail.fm




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