help me please situation CritiCal

evzen · 05-09-2006, 01:00 AM

I accidentaly changed the shell for root to "my name"
now whenever i am trying to log on as root it log me off and says cannot execute "my name" however i can log on as subuser
how to log on as root if i know the password but it just allways log me off
please help

stormyk88 · 05-09-2006, 01:13 AM

What 'shell' did you change? I know very little about this, but I recently forgot my root pw and had to wipe my system. I know there are other ways around it, someone else with more knowledge than me will chime in soon.

daihard · 05-09-2006, 01:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stormyk88

What 'shell' did you change? I know very little about this, but I recently forgot my root pw and had to wipe my system. I know there are other ways around it, someone else with more knowledge than me will chime in soon.

He must have changed his login shell. The default for the GNU/Linux system is bash.

If you use Fedora Core, you can invoke system-config-users, type in your root password (which should be doable since it does not invoke the shell), and change the shell of root back to /bin/bash. I haven't tried it myself, but it *should* work.

ehawk · 05-09-2006, 02:55 AM

I think this should work (get other opinions)

First, you need to log in using linux single mode

http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/l...ng-single.html

When you are logged in this way (as root) change the shell using chsh:

chsh -s /bin/sh (or whatever)

http://unixhelp.ed.ac.uk/CGI/man-cgi?chsh+1

You should also change the subject description to something more descriptive, before a moderator freezes this thread and prevents you from getting more help.

cs-cam · 05-09-2006, 03:13 AM

Could also change it in /etc/passwd.

ethics · 05-09-2006, 03:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cs-cam

Could also change it in /etc/passwd.

That'd be my suggestion too, either if you have Sudo setup, or just su from a user with a working shell

evzen · 05-09-2006, 09:30 PM

yes i did changed login shell iam running slackware and i guess ill try first what daihard sugested thanx for now **it did not work
su doesnt work neither, single mode doesnt work
how do i change the login shell** chsh for root wont work from user mode damnit

gilead · 05-09-2006, 11:41 PM

If all else fails, you can boot the box with your system CD, mount the partition containing /etc and modify the passwd file.

gilead · 05-10-2006, 10:55 PM

By the way, once you've booted the PC with the rescue CD, you'd do something like the following. I'm assuming the partition containing the /etc directory is on /dev/hda1 and that it is ext3:

Code:

mkdir -p /mnt/harddisk
mount -t ext3 /dev/hda1 /mnt/harddisk
vi /mnt/harddisk/etc/passwd

You can use any text editor, it doesn't have to be vi (pico, joe, etc.). The line for root should be something like:

Code:

root:x:0:0::/root:/bin/bash

Hope that helps...