Cannot change root pasword

[Manoj Misra]

Hi All,

I'm not able to change my root password.

WARNING: YOU ARE SUPERUSER !!
root@INS1 >
root@INS1 >passwd
ulimit: Not owner
root@INS1 >

I'm running HP 11.00 and NIS is not installed.
Please advice what's the reason and solution.
Thanks
Manoj

[Stefan Farrelly]

Things to try;

1. /usr/bin/passwd root
2. ulimit unlimited (then 1.)
3. try loggin in as root on the console then run /usr/bin/passwd

Sounds like either a patch issue or someone has been mucking around with ulimits in your .profile or /etc/profile.

[Animesh Chakraborty]

Hi Manoj,
Please check /etc/passwd file for root shell.
It should be '/sbin/sh' .
please post the output of ulimit -a

Thanks
Animesh

[Manoj Misra]

Hi,
Thanks for ur reply.

It says ulimit: NOT owner,

Here is the output of ulimit -a
AETHOS:ACT(INS1):~ 54> ulimit unlimited
AETHOS:ACT(INS1):~ 55> passwd
ulimit: Not owner
AETHOS:ACT(INS1):~ 56> ulimit -a
time(seconds) unlimited
file(blocks) unlimited
data(kbytes) 65536
stack(kbytes) 8192
memory(kbytes) unlimited
coredump(blocks) 4194303
nofiles(descriptors) 2048

[Christian Gebhardt]

If you have tusc installed run

tusc passwd > tuscfile

you have to have a line in this tuscfile:

...
ulimit(UL_SETFSIZE, 2147483647) ............................................................................. = 4194303
...

In "man ulimit" you can read:
__________________________
....
ulimit() fails and the limit is unchanged if a process with an effective user ID other than super-user attempts to increase its file size limit.
....
__________________________

Maybe it's a problem with your uid. Are you login as root, su to root, do you have more than one user with UID 0 ?

Christian

[S.K. Chan]

Double check the permission of these files/executables ..
/bin/passwd
/bin/login
/bin/su
All of them should be -r-sr-xr-x owned by root:bin. Especially the prmission, if they are not set correctly change them .. for example ..
# cd /bin
# chmod 4555 passwd

[Manoj Misra]

Problem is solved by changing the permissions of password excutable.

-r-sr-xr-x 5 bin bin 49152 Apr 9 1998 passwd

to

-r-sr-xr-x 5 root bin 49152 Apr 9 1998 passwd

But the error was misleading. Why ????
Regards
Manoj

[Christian Gebhardt]

The reason of the error is in my previous answer.

Only root can set ulimit and if passwd binary has ownership bin the ulimit is not allowed.

I've tested it and on my system it's the same behaviour.

On trusted system for example the error message is:

# passwd
audswitch: Not owner
#

Christian