I need to change the permissions on some files on a hard drive for a machine that I dont have root access on.

This is my plan.

1. Power down, and remove hard drive from old SUN Solaris machine

2. Install dual boot Mandrake Linux on my Windows 2000 PC

3. Install old hard drive into Windows 2000 box

4. Restart PC and boot into Linux as root

5. mount the hard drive

6. change the permissions of files on the hard drive

7. Take out hard drive and put it back on the original SUN box.


For step 7, do I have to remount the hard drive in the original SUN box, or will just fitting it back into the slot be enough? I'm not changing any of the data files or locations, just the permissions on a few of the noncritical system files.

You can easily download and burn a bootable Linux CD so that you can boot to the CD, mount the UFS disk, make your permission changes and put the drive back in the Sun machine, leaving the OS configuration on your Windows 2000 PC untouched.

I know I wouldn't want to screw around with my Windows partition just to make a permission change on a Sun machine. I'm guessing that there is a much easier way to accomplish your task.

yeah the problem is I dont have a Solaris 5.1 CD for the old SUN box to boot from.

Are you saying I can boot the SUN machine using a new Linux CD and that it doesnt have to be the same OS version that the hard drive was originally mounted/formatted under?

hopbalt, Knoppix (http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/) is a Live version of Linux that runs directly off of the CD. This should help you to change the permissions without removing the HDD.

If this is all legit as you say...

And no one has the root password for this workstaton?

I believe you mean CPU type of which the SUN machine is the SPARC. Knoppix live CD is only for i86 processors. Nope, doesn't have to be the same OS as originally formatted.

Also the hard drive is probably SCSI. Which means installing a SCSI controller and finding the adaptors etc to connect the drive. That is if you don't already have a controller.

You might be able to use install CD for SPARC to boot in rescue mode. Mount the drive and modify the files. I will assume that it has UFS support. I don't know if there are any UFS capabilites for rescue mode on the i86 CD distros.

If you stick the drive on your W2k machine and install linux you might have to recompile the kernel to get ufs for read / write capabilities.

And it would be best to reinstall the hard drive like it was. Is it in a removable chassis?

I was suggesting that you remove the drive from the Sun machine, install it in an Intel machine, boot a CD-Based Linux distro for ia32 and mount the drive. I could be wrong, but I believe that UFS support can be enabled using a LKM.

I will try the Solaris 9 CD reboot tactic first and see if that works.

I'd rather not remove the hard drive unless I absolutely have to