Hello.
I'm trying to recover the root password with sarge but I've a problem.

In woody release, the procedure was:

from CD :
linux init=/bin/sh
At the root prompt:

#mount -n -o remount,rw / (mount the / as read write).
#vi /etc/shadow.... etc...

With sarge, the command mount -n -o remount,rw / says "can't find /etc/fstab".

Pleaase, could you help me?
Thank you.

fab65

Hmm... that's odd. Since you're remounting / and not /etc, it must mean that /etc is just a folder under /, or you've misunderstood soomething. You only have one post, so I can't check on your "background", so I choose to not give you the benefit of the doubt (that is, I assume you're a newbie--no offense meant) (on the other hand, you use vi... hmm... you might have been spoon-fed enough instructions, so that doesn't disprove my guess).

That implies that my guess that /etc is just a folder may be wrong. One possibility (which I think is somewhat likely) is that you haven't mounted your /etc partition. So mount /etc `manually', read-write of course, and go ahead and do your deed. You may want to mount some other partitions as well (say, if you have a seperate /usr, you'll probably want to mount it).

Hope this helps --Jonas

Hmm... that's odd. Since you're remounting / and not /etc, it must mean that /etc is just a folder under /, or you've misunderstood soomething. You only have one post, so I can't check on your "background", so I choose to not give you the benefit of the doubt (that is, I assume you're a newbie--no offense meant) (on the other hand, you use vi... hmm... you might have been spoon-fed enough instructions, so that doesn't disprove my guess).

That implies that my guess that /etc is just a folder may be wrong. One possibility (which I think is somewhat likely) is that you haven't mounted your /etc partition. So mount /etc `manually', read-write of course, and go ahead and do your deed. You may want to mount some other partitions as well (say, if you have a seperate /usr, you'll probably want to mount it).

Hope this helps --Jonas

You may not have the root partition mounted, and are running in the ramdisk.
Type the "mount" command by itself to see what is mounted.
Also check the output of the "fdisk -l" command which lists which drives/partitions it finds. Then determine whether the root parition is mounted. If not, you could mount it under /mnt and then use the chroot command to make it your new root partition for that shell. Then "mount -a" will attempt to mount everything in your /etc/fstab file that has the "auto" option. Next for good measure, I would run "/bin/bash -l". This will start a new login shell, which will setup your normal aliases and paths.

This is a side comment, but you can also boot into single-user mode and change the root password or do other stuff as root from there (see here for more information).

Hi,
the procedure is easy if you have your Cd 1 ( installer disk).
boot with it as you want to install, when the hard disk is detected, change screen ctrl+alt+F2, for example, and now you have the root but for the installer kernel ( from CD),
detect the number of your / partition with fdisk if you don't know it!!
the name of the disc is not /dev/hda, hdb,( not yet at this step of installation) but it is /dev/ide/......., ( for ide disk ) use TAB to complete the name

mkdir mt ........> create a mount point

mount /dev/ide/......( partition) mt
chroot mt -------> to switch to your disk
mount -t proc /proc /proc --------> in general not required
passwd ----------------------> to change the password, that is OK

I have done this procedure many and many time it is working fine, you can use it also to reinstall the grub, if for example, you have detroyed it by install wind$,
grub-install /dev/hda ( if you have an ide disk)

Hope this help you

best regards
bela

Hi Bela.
Thank you. Your suggestion works well!!

Fab65