When I set these boxes up a long time ago - was asked if I wanted a "grub" 
passwd,  I just blew on by it.  I started a long time ago using Unix System 
V,  BDS 4.2,  RedHat 7.1, and finally SL and never thought I needed one.

I just checked the box down the hall running Susi 9.2 and it does not have 
a "grub" passwd and the root passwd worked perfectly a few hours ago.
My only complaint is that when the failure happened it asked for the "root 
passwd" and it did not work.   It accepted it and  It was pretty clear from 
the error messages that it was looking for something other than what it asked 
for!!
I restarted the system and put in bogus passwds and was able to enter 3 before 
it dropped me back to the service prompt.  That still works like it should.
This is a minor nit but a big pain in the posterior if it happens on a busy 
day.  Since we are a for profit organization - every minute counts.
When I get a test box put together I will try the "rescue" boot option again.
To assume that the hardware fault was caused by and intruder and disable the 
root passwd is nuts.  That is why we have root passwd on a system.   We lock 
up door to the server room.   Have keys on the boxes to prevent unauthorized 
access and the building is locked at night.

Larry Linder

On Friday 15 October 2010 11:26 am, Stephan Wiesand wrote:
> On Oct 15, 2010, at 17:02, [log in to unmask] wrote:
> > Don't you fix the initial problem with a 'rescue' image?  Seem to recall
> > doing this several times before on a variety on version of
> > RedHat/Fedora/Scientific Linux.  Or am I misunderstanding?
>
> Not unless I'm as well. Of course you don't even need a rescue disk, nor
> the root password, if you just know the grub password. ;-)
>
> 	Stephan
>
> > 	Martin.
> > --
> > Martin Bly
> > RAL Tier1 Fabric Manager
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: [log in to unmask]
> >
> > [mailto:owner-scientific-
> >
> >> [log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Larry Linder
> >> Sent: Friday, October 15, 2010 1:51 PM
> >> To: [log in to unmask]
> >> Subject: Replacing Hard Disks with a logical disk names.
> >>
> >> A simple problem that I had done for years, turned  out to be
> >
> > difficult due to
> >
> >> a mistake I made and what I believe is an error in the Linux OS.
> >> How you set it up is to forget to remove the logical drive from
> >
> > "/etc/fstab"
> >
> >> in the past it was never a problem.
> >> But in SL 5.5 it is a serious problem because during boot it can't
> >
> > find the
> >
> >> drive name.  It drops you to a maintenance level and all you used to
> >
> > do in
> >
> >> put in the root pass word, edit the files etc.
> >> What happen now:
> >> put in your password
> >> "bash  /usr/bin/id:   no such file or dir"
> >> "bash  [: =: unary operator expected"
> >> "bash  /usr/bin/id:"
> >> "bash [: =: unary operator expected"
> >> "bash /usr/bin/kpg-config: no such file or dir"
> >>
> >>> repair file system1
> >>
> >> As a result you can do nothing because your passwd has been rejected.
> >>
> >> You are back to using your install disks. It recognizes un initialized
> >
> > disks
> >
> >> and initializes them - do a new install and set up disks and disk
> >
> > names and
> >
> >> do not format anything, except new disk,  setup root / passwd, set up
> >> internet, do not install any thing.   and it knows there is an active
> >
> > OS
> >
> >> present and the install aborts.
> >>
> >> The system reboots and runs normally everthing is preserved all
> >
> > because some
> >
> >> security nit modified the code and never checked the end result.
> >> Sometime you can be so secure that the system becomes worthless.
> >>
> >> What used to be a simple thing of replacing disks has now been
> >
> > difficult at
> >
> >> best.
> >> What I fixed is to get rid of the logical names in in the fstab and
> >
> > went back
> >
> >> to the /dev/sda1 etc.   This was done because I didn't have a good way
> >
> > to
> >
> >> look at disks and their names but knew the hardware.
> >>
> >> For back up on paper you need to do "df" and pipe it to lpr, keep in
> >
> > you file
> >
> >> folder as a true back up.
> >>
> >> You can easily create this problem by simply unplugging a disk and
> >
> > trying a
> >
> >> reboot.
> >>
> >> I have three backups but I never had a disk that was good but the
> >
> > electronics
> >
> >> became intermittent as a function of temperature.  suspect a bad
> >
> > solder joint
> >
> >> or circuit trace crack somewhere.   The symptom was a nice running
> >
> > drive that
> >
> >> was sluggish.   A reboot solved the problem but the failures began to
> >> increase.   Users don't seem to understand a system being down.
> >> Some of these boxes are shut down ever six months for cleaning.
> >>
> >> Disks being cheep it time to install a new one and toss the old one.
> >>
> >> Larry Linder
> >
> > --
> > Scanned by iCritical.