[SOLVED] User & password Problems

business_kid · 01-18-2022, 06:07 AM

To avoid continuing the old thread (Getting ssd booting…), we'll deal here with password problems. The image I'm using is:
slarm64-current-aarch64-xfce-raspberry_pi_4-5.15.5-build-20211128.img
from November 2020.

I have not been able to get a user's password set at all in Slarm64. Comparing with a PC Slackware64 install, I found user entries were not getting added to /etc/passwd, or /etc/passwd-. I manually edited those as root, pasted in from my pc a line from /etc/passwd, changed the user password using the root account, and I was able to log in to agetty consoles.

To get into X, I had to:remove lightdm-chooser from /etc/pam.d/; change /etc/inittab from runlevel 4 to runlevel 3; Then log in at the prompt, and run 'startx.'

Also worth noting is that the user's home dir is not created. Further, a user doesn't have permission to make it, so I had to do that with root with a separate command, and then change perms on it.

When it comes to password stuff, I'm clueless. I'm conscious that both of those solutions are workarounds, not fixes. I feel a review of that password stuff in needed, however. I can't be of much help because my expertise is in electronic hardware, not software.

hazel · 01-18-2022, 06:36 AM

If you have to edit passwd, shadow or groups manually, use vipw and vigr. They work like visudo, creating a temporary file to hold the edited text and checking for correct syntax before copying it over.

business_kid · 01-18-2022, 12:00 PM

Thanks Hazel,

It appears I was able to fool the password stuff, but I am pretty clueless about pam which slackware has added now. But I'm not out to reinvent or develop Slarm64, that's not my field.

It looks to me like an OS issue with Slarm64. I installed a binary image, which should work out of the box, but doesn't. There are some Arm-specific patches required to get things compiled. It looked to me like the 'useradd' program should have the sticky bit set, but it doesn't need that in the x86_64 version. But a RazPi is not an X86_64 compatible - it's an sbc in an SoC or two.

hazel · 01-18-2022, 12:07 PM

You don't happen to have the saved contents of /etc/pam.d/lightdm-chooser, do you? I might be able to interpret it for you.

sndwvs · 01-18-2022, 12:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by business_kid

To avoid continuing the old thread (Getting ssd booting…), we'll deal here with password problems. The image I'm using is:
slarm64-current-aarch64-xfce-raspberry_pi_4-5.15.5-build-20211128.img
from November 2020.

I have not been able to get a user's password set at all in Slarm64. Comparing with a PC Slackware64 install, I found user entries were not getting added to /etc/passwd, or /etc/passwd-. I manually edited those as root, pasted in from my pc a line from /etc/passwd, changed the user password using the root account, and I was able to log in to agetty consoles.

To get into X, I had to:remove lightdm-chooser from /etc/pam.d/; change /etc/inittab from runlevel 4 to runlevel 3; Then log in at the prompt, and run 'startx.'

Also worth noting is that the user's home dir is not created. Further, a user doesn't have permission to make it, so I had to do that with root with a separate command, and then change perms on it.

When it comes to password stuff, I'm clueless. I'm conscious that both of those solutions are workarounds, not fixes. I feel a review of that password stuff in needed, however. I can't be of much help because my expertise is in electronic hardware, not software.

after boot there is a single root user and password is set on first login in both kosol and lighthdm. field from the root user you create any user and configure it as you need it.

business_kid · 01-18-2022, 12:59 PM

Lightdm-autologin looks like this

Code:

#%PAM-1.0

# Block login if they are globally disabled
auth      required pam_nologin.so

# Load environment from /etc/environment and ~/.pam_environment
auth      required pam_env.so

# Allow access without authentication
auth      required pam_permit.so

# Stop autologin if account requires action
account   required pam_unix.so

# Can't change password
password  required pam_deny.so

# Setup session
session   required pam_unix.so

From my POV, I've got a functional system, and reported back what I had to do to get it working. It's over to others now. There's still a password required on login to X, and to unlock the screensaver. If this is patched I'll test it. I'd like not to have passwords, but that's not the fault of a file I hid from the system!

Anyhow this reply comes to you courtesy of my RazPi as a user in X under firefox, so I'm happy as a pig in s***, as the farmers say.

hazel · 01-18-2022, 02:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by business_kid

Lightdm-autologin looks like this
# Block login if they are globally disabled
auth required pam_nologin.so

That one just stops logins when root has disabled them because of system work

Quote:

# Load environment from /etc/environment and ~/.pam_environment
auth required pam_env.so

Sets the environment. I doubt if that would cause problems.

Quote:

# Allow access without authentication
auth required pam_permit.so

That's supposed to allow autologins. But the man page says it can cause problems in other modules if the display manager doesn't provide a user name.

Quote:

# Stop autologin if account requires action
account required pam_unix.so

pam_unix is the module that checks the passwd and shadow files. It's one of the oldest pam modules so unlikely to be the culprit here.

Quote:

# Can't change password
password required pam_deny.so

Well, that shouldn't cause problems

Quote:

# Setup session
session required pam_unix.so

Ditto.

Looks like pam_permit is the most likely culprit. I hate autologins anyway. What on earth is the point of having passwords if any Tom, Dick or Harry can just barge in without one?

business_kid · 01-23-2022, 06:08 AM

Just coming back on this:

Quote:

after boot there is a single root user and password is set on first login in both kosol and lighthdm. field from the root user you create any user and configure it as you need it.

That's the theory. But if it worked here, I wouldn't be posting about password issues.

I'm marking this solved. It's actually worked around, because /etc/passw* is not getting user entries when I add a user/set it's passwd with root. I worked around by pasdting a line in, then changing the passwd on that.

I've gone to runlevel 3 in /etc/inittab, where I can log in as a user (hooray!) Then run startx.

Likewise I disabled all the paranoid stuff, because this RazPi is a media box hung out of my tv. Security is an irritation there, and the software's backed up as of last night. I mean to try going straight to runlevel 4 again sometime, but I reboot it so rarely, it's gone on the long finger.

EDIT: I returned to runlevel 4 by default, and all is as desired.