If you forget your password, ask the system administrator (root
user) to assign a new password to your account.
Only root can do this.
In general, no one can retrieve your old password from the
/etc/shadow file.
If your password is short or a single word, your system administrator—or a hacker—can
easily figure it out, but you're better off with a new password.
If you're the system administrator, and you've forgotten the password for
root, you need to find an alternate way to access the
/etc/passwd and /etc/shadow files in order to
reset the root password.
Some possible ways to do this are:
- Boot the system from another disk or device where you can log in as
root (such as from an installation CD), and,
from there, manually reset the password.
- Access the necessary files from the root account of another
Neutrino machine, using Qnet.
For more information, see
Using Qnet for Transparent Distributed Processing.
- Remove the media on which the /etc/passwd and
/etc/shadow are stored and install it on another
Neutrino machine from which you can modify the files.
- In the case of an embedded system, build a new image that contains new
passwd and shadow files, and then transfer
it to your target system.