I have successfully changed my root password, but when I boot my log in screen asks for a name, so I enter 'root' and the correct password, but then it says 'the system administrator is not allowed to log in from this screen'

The question is: So where do I go to log in as root?

sub note to explain the situation, not really relevant to the booting problem
(so I can use the KD partition manager to format an external usb hard drive I want to make available - currently it has gOS on it but won't boot from it on my PC because my PC doesn't recognise a USB drive as bootable)

Welcome to LQ kngly!

Now, to login as root in Ubuntu, 2 ways
Open a terminal from desktop menu and enter "sudo su" plus your root password, which should be your reg password.

to login as root in console(no X)
press cntrl-alt-F1 at desktop and you'll be "in the dark",
that is, in a console.

Now, also, it's quite easy to boot most distro's even on pc's that won't do it.

Is your usb device fat16/32 or ext2 or ext3?

That may have been a mistake. In Ubuntu, you are expected to not assign a root password.

You don't. Please read the documentation and learn to use sudo for administrating your system.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Sw...untu/FromLinux

Hi Guys, thanks for the suggestions. The external disk I was referring to was initially EXT3 from an abandoned Linux distro. Before I got your help, I went back to XP (sort of wash my mouth out) and used Quest's Partition Magic to reformat the drive to NTFS, as I had expected to use it with XP once again. Now I am in the process of rebuilding an unused 'extra' system specifically for Linux (gOS?).

Regarding the need to learn to use the console, I did all this 30 years ago before computers really started, and used Basic, and Pascal, and then Compiled Basic etc to create a desk top system for my dental practice (it was successful for my needs, but would be unacceptable now). I am rather dis-inclined to go back to the command line.

If Linux won't "just work" then too bad, I'll wait for a development that does. The two nearest approaches to this are Ubuntu 9 and Xandros EeePC 900. They both "just work": at least up to a point. I am rather interested in cloud computing and netbooks as this is the way of the future IMHO. The forthcoming Google/Linux distro will indeed be most interesting, hence my forthcoming attempt to run gOS as a taster.

Your responses to all this will be rather intriguing!

I think you will find the Linux command line is a pleasure to use. It is much more powerful and convenient than DOS ever was. Spend some time reading the man and info pages to learn your way around the system. The time you invest early on will pay exponential dividends in time saved later.

As you say Ubuntu just works to a point. There will be things that don't work out of the box, or things that get broken for reasons you may not understand. When those things happen, I recommend joyfully accepting the learning opportunity.

Good luck with it.

You're a really good bunch, thx for putting up with me. OK I'll go search the Linux forums for lessons and read whatever manuals I can get my hands on. Could be that just the time needed to do the study will have to be found!

to paraphrase the chorus in Oliver, Cheerio, but I'll be back soon!

There is no reason you couldn't login in graphically although it is strongly discouraged. You just need to find the proper menu (hint: it's under System > Admin).
But, hey, if all you need to do is format a drive, you may as well install gparted from the repositories or install the gnome-format utility. At least one of those will prompt for your password, which will be safer than working in a root GUI.

I don't really think GOS is representative of what Google has in mind for us. The version I tried a couple of years ago was essentially standard linux with some google apps; nothing you couldn't get any other linux distribution to do with a little effort. For example, Ubuntu has things like prism to run google apps and it is quite easy to install Google Desktop and Picasa.