Linux Gazette

   ...making Linux just a little more fun!

June 2005 (#115):

     * [1]The Mailbag
     * [2]News Bytes, by Michael Conry
     * [3]Python  for  scientific  use, Part II: Data analysis, by Anders
       Andreasen
     * [4]Piercing Firewalls with OpenSSH, by Mike Chirico
     * [5]Gmail on Home Linux Box using Postfix and Fetchmail, by Mike Chirico
     * [6]HelpDex, by Shane Collinge
     * [7]Ponders Corner, by Rick Moen
     * [8]Exploring procfs, by Awasthi Nirendra
     * [9]Staying Connected, by Ben Okopnik
     * [10]Introduction to Shell Scripting, part 5, by Ben Okopnik
     * [11]WSGI Explorations in Python, by Mike Orr (Sluggo)
     * [12]Design Awareness, by Mark Seymour

The Mailbag
     _________________________________________________________________

                                General Mail
   Submit comments about articles, or articles themselves (after reading
   [13]our guidelines) to [14]The Editors of Linux Gazette, and technical
           answers and tips about Linux to [15]The Answer Gang. 
     _________________________________________________________________

     * [16]Reset root password
     * [17]Debian's policy regarding security updates
     * [18]Y2k type problem for linux!!!! how true????
     * [19]Suse 9.X and the SOBER worm
     _________________________________________________________________

And Now, A Message From The Crypt...

   by Ben Okopnik, Editor-in-Chief

   Greetings, all. This month's Mailbag is getting hammered out by yours truly:
   Heather Stern, our Editor Gal and Scissor Wielder ne plus ultra, is away at
   [20]Baycon (as I understand it, she's working just as hard on keeping their
   networks running as she would on editing LG, which at least implies enviable
   connectivity for the attendees.) "Hammering" may, in fact, be just the right
   word  for  what I'm doing here - I have wielded a large mallet, a 12HP
   chainsaw, and a rusty pipe wrench where she might have used a fine scalpel
   and a jeweler's screwdriver - but somehow, the Mailbag got done. The point
   is, if you hate the look of it this month, blame me; it's not Heather's
   fault. If you love it, credit her - I've tried to follow her basic layout,
   although my version is built by hand rather than via her high-tech scripts.

   In other - but still related - news, whereas Heather keeps (and processes)
   all the Answer Gang mail for the month, I... umm... don't. That is, I do
   read  it,  but  as far as keeping it, well, on my system, it's chiefly
   noticeable by its absence. :) In other words, TAG will be back next month.
   Meanwhile,  for  your  reading  pleasure and (hopefully) gain in Linux
   knowledge, we have a series of discussions garnered from Usenet by [21]Rick
   Moen of our own Answer Gang. Rick participated in these discussions, and
   thought that our readers might benefit from seeing them - and I find that I
   agree with him: "there's gold in them hills!" So, enjoy. As always, comments
   are welcome; send them to [22]The Answer Gang, and you may see your name
   appear in lights - or at least in our pages.
     _________________________________________________________________

Reset root password

partze <eron(at)lowzo(dot)com> wrote:

I lost my root password.  Running Fedora Core 2 and I'm trying to
figure out how to reset it.  I can login locally as a regular user.
Is there a way that I can reset the root password from the system
without using 3rd party tools?

Bit Twister <BitTwister(at)mouse-potato(dot)com> wrote:

On Thu, 19 May 2005 11:21:46 -0400, partze wrote:
> I lost my root password.  Running Fedora Core 2 and I'm trying to
> figure out how to reset it.  I can login locally as a regular user.
> Is there a way that I can reset the root password from the system
> without using 3rd party tools?

Depends on which boot loader you use

----------------- using grub  ----------------------
When at the grub menu

Hit  e  to get to the edit mode
You should be on the Kernel line containing /vmlinuz
Hit  e  again and add a
      space single
to the end of line and hit Enter key. Example:
    kernel (hd0,4)/vmlinuz 1 root=/dev/hda9 mem=128M single
then b to boot

You then come to the sh-nnn# prompt.

When you "exit" the system will continue booting.

If single does not work, try a 1 instead.