root password

[kacou]

Is it possible to rename the root password and give it to another administrator. After doing his job,is it possible to use again the old passord?

[Torsten.]

Use "passwd" to change the password, once the job is done, use passwd to change it back (if system is untrusted without keeping pwd history).

[Kenan Erdey]

or give root access with sudo. once job is done take the privilege back.

[Jeeshan]

its not a good practice to give anyone the root password unless he has administrative member.

in your scenario after changing the password and after than revert to previous password, it depends upon your password re-usage settings in password security section.

you can find the password re-usage options in SAM.

[Sajjad Sahir]

Dear Kacau

I got u question
first clarification there is renaming of passwd
the only option is change the passwd
by using passwd command
second thing once u given passwd u can use
old passwd by againg changing to the old one
at a time there is no option to use two passwd(Is it possible to rename the root password and give it to another administrator. After doing his job,is it possible to use again the old passord)
ok
for changing passwd command is passwd
ok

[Robin T. Slotten]

An alternative is to create another user (roottmp) with a UID of 0 (zero). This user will effectively be root. When (s)he is finished, delete the roottmp user. As pointed out previously, be certain you trust this temporary user.

Rob...

[MarkSyder · Accepted solution]

DO NOT create a temporary user with UID 0! When you delete that user you will delete all files belonging to UID 0; i.e. root. You will then not have a server, you will have a large paperweight.

Mark Syder (like the drink but spelt different)

[Robin T. Slotten]

I respectfully disagree. If you remove the user using sam, sam is smart enough to see the duplicate UID (which it also noted when it was created) and will not allow the files to be removed or reallocated to another user. This was tested on a secure system.

On an non-secure system, you can edit /etc/passwd directly and copy the root entry and edit it. Just clear the password field, save the /et/passwd file and immeadiately change the roottmp password. I have used this method to give access to HP engineers when working on the system. You can just delete the line in /etc/passwd to remove the temporary user.

Rob...

[MarkSyder]

Robin,

If you're going to advise someone to set up a user with UID 0 you should have warned him about the pitfalls and the appropriate way to delete that user straight away.

Mark

[Sridhar R]

Hey,

why dont you change the roottmp's id to some other non-existent id with the help of usermod command,

which will make him as an ordinary user
and then u can remove the user.

This is also an option!

Thanks!