[lug] Su problems

[David Morris]

> Dan Ferris wrote:
> 
> >This is driving me nuts.
> >
> >The system is SuSE 9.0
> >
> >dferris at stargate:~> su
> >Password:
> >su: incorrect password
> >dferris at stargate:~>

The possible causes have already been pretty well
covered...I can't really add to them, but I can offer a
preventative measure for the future and a solution to
getting back in.  (Assuming you haven't just fat-fingered
the password a few dozen times in a row like I did last
year. ;)

Install sudo on all linux/unix machines and set any admins
as sudoers.  sudo allows you root access using your *own*
password (and in this case it sound like that still works),
and loggs all activity using the sudo command.

In fiddling with systems, I've sometimes done the most silly
things you can immagine (hey, lets move /lib to a different
partition!  umm, why can't I even use ls anymore? <wince> :)
....using sudo doesn't prevent me from messing up the
system, but it does give me a record of what I did to mess
up the system, as well as giving me a back door in if I
somehow mess up the root account (which I have also done).

Regardless of what you do in the future or what happened to
cause this problem, one way to get back in is to use Tom's
Root-Boot Linux.  Its a floppy-disk linux distro that
includes most common hardware drivers and allows you to go
into your system as root to fix problems like this.

--David