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Lost root password

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denise
Posts: 34
Joined: 2004-02-17 13:39

Lost root password

#1 Post by denise »

I didn't need my root password for a long time now.
But now I need it again but I forgot it.
Can somebody help me please?

lacek
Posts: 764
Joined: 2004-03-11 18:49
Location: Budapest, Hungary
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#2 Post by lacek »

This is how to do it:

Boot from the Debian CD, and after the install starts, press ALT+F2 (to switch to that console), and press enter. You'll get a shell.
Mount your root partition to /mnt.
Edit /mnt/etc/shadow. The first line looks like this:
root:$1$A(...garbage...)J3/:12324:0:99999:7:::
Remove all the characters between the first and the second colon. You have to end up with this line:
root::12324:0:99999:7:::

If you're done, unmount the root partition from the /mnt directory, and reboot your computer. The root will have no password.

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