su command prob in hp-ux 10.20

[bnkannan]

Hi ,

I have E class server which has HP-UX 10.20,Whenever i try to excecute "su" command from user level ,it gives "can not get efective user id" error message.What could be the prob.

[Rita C Workman]

Usually problems with doing 'su' are related to:

A problem in the .profile
Check- try adding set -x as the first line

A problem with the /etc/passwd file
Check this and make sure it's ok..look for underscores where they don't belong, etc. Might run pwck to see if this helps find any problems.

A problem with the permissions
Try resetting them
chmod 4555 /usr/bin/su
chown root:bin /usr/bin/su

But wait for others input....they may have the perfect answer to this,

/rcw

[Patrick Wallek]

Have you checked the passwd file to make sure that there is not a problem with it? You may try running the pwchk command. I think that command is correct, it's close if it's not.

[Steven Sim Kok Leong]

Hi,

Remember to run chown before chmod. If you run chmod before chown, chown will reset your permissions from 4755 to 0755 and render your initial chmod ineffective.

Hope this helps. Regards.

Steven Sim
Brainbench MVP for Unix Admin
http://www.brainbench.com

[Dan Hetzel]

Hi,

I've found a post relating the same problem:
http://my1.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,1150,0x83810559ff7cd4118fef0090279cd0f9!0,00.html

Dan