Issue with Informix Install - Get Shadow Password for user [informix] failed!

[Robin King_1]

We have a fresh install on informix on HP-UX 11.11
My collegue is having issues soing anything in the database, the follwoing error messages are in the online.log

09:48:27 Get Shadow Password for user [informix] failed!
09:48:27 Check for password aging/account lock-out.
09:48:27 listener-thread: err = -951: oserr = 13: errstr = informix: Incorrect password or user informix is not known on the database server.

The system is trusted, and has the Shadow Password file software installed (not sure if this is neccessary if it's trusted).
There is a valid informix user and group, and the account is not locked. You can log in with it as expected.
The contents of $INFORMIXDIR look correct, with the expected mix of file ownership between informix and root.
I've checked for all files with suid and sgid, and they match another identical system.

Can anyone suggest what to try next?

Thanks

[Arunvijai_4]

Hello,

Have you disabled password aging ?

# modprpw -m mintm=0,lftm=0,exptm=0,expwarn=0

-Arun

[Robin King_1]

Yes password ageing is disabled by default at the moment.

[Robin King_1]

Another point......if we untrust the system, the problem goes away.

[Steve Lewis]

I suspect you need at least Dynamic server 9.30 and C-SDK 2.30. That's what you need for LDAP anyway.

If your system is in trusted mode, you do not need shadow passwords, because the password field will already be moved out of /etc/passwd and into the structure under /tcb. I suspect that shadow passwords may be incompatible with trusted and you may need to undo shadow before going into trusted mode.

If you have made changes to sqlhosts for shadow passwords, you need to undo them for trusted.

See this thread for more info on modprpw. Also check that the new informix password format is valid for your trusted mode standards (correct length, numeric chars etc) because it may get re-disabled.

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=436112

[Robin King_1]

Steve, we don't have either of those installed, but we also don't have them on an identical system that is working.

I've removed the Shadow PW App now, so that can't be getting in the way.

I've been assured nothing has been changed in the sqlhosts

I've removed the informix user, and re-added it, so I know it's a valid account.

[Robin King_1]

As with all these things, it turned out to be very simple in the end. The filesystem in which $INFORMIXDIR resides had nosuid set. Once i changed that, it all worked fine.

[Robin King_1]

**closed**