admin password

amcarthur · 06-16-2005, 11:00 AM

I am new at this. I have taken a job as administrator at this office. The old administrator never left his password. He said he created an admin user/password for me, but this does not work. Is is possible to change his password without knowing it. They are using Openbsd on the server. I know a little on openbsd how to create new users/change passwords. I can type my user name and password but when I type su and the password it comes up and says "you are not in the group wheel BAD SU to root."
Any info would help.......

xaenn · 06-16-2005, 11:35 AM

The reason you can't su is because you're not in the group wheel. However, I don't think without being root that you can change that...

Edit: Why not just log onto root from the start? When you do that you can add your user to the group wheel and you should be fine...Assuming that the password he gave you was correct for root.

crash748 · 06-16-2005, 11:54 AM

boot into single user mode, boot -s at the bootprompt.
then you can get a root shell without using a password.
- edit the root passwd
- add your admin acount to wheel

hellfish · 06-16-2005, 11:58 AM

what about :
starting from cd into shell mode, mounting the openbsd-root-partition from
the disklabel and change the /etc/passwd file by deleting all the crypto
stuff in it ? then, there should be no password required anymore to log
in as user root.

amcarthur · 06-16-2005, 03:30 PM

The user and password he set up is on the wheel but does not work.
It comes up and says "This account is currently not available"
Anyone's help would be appreciated.....Thanks

RJW · 06-16-2005, 07:44 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by crash748
boot into single user mode, boot -s at the bootprompt.
then you can get a root shell without using a password.
- edit the root passwd
- add your admin acount to wheel

Have you tried this?

rehab junkie · 06-16-2005, 07:45 PM

As hellfish suggested, boot to single user mode, mount / read/write and remove the password hashes from /etc/passwd - then exit single user mode to continue the boot process, and login as root, just hitting enter for a blank password. Then set yourself a new password.

amcarthur · 06-17-2005, 10:27 AM

Thanks to everyone's help. It worked.
Thanks again.

rehab junkie · 06-20-2005, 05:16 AM

Would you please mind stating what it was that worked, for future reference by people searching the forum?

amcarthur · 06-20-2005, 10:13 AM

I thank everyone for their help.
What I did was boot into single user mode, boot -s at the bootprompt.
then I can got a root shell without using a password.
- What I did was edit the root passwd
and then added my admin acount to wheel
Thanks again...................

rehab junkie · 06-20-2005, 08:26 PM

No problem.