[ubuntu-uk] Corrupted User Accounts?

[Kris Douglas]

On 20 December 2010 15:27, Simon Greenwood <sfgreenwood at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> On 20 December 2010 15:17, Gordon Burgess-Parker <gbplinux at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> On 20/12/10 15:08, Simon Greenwood wrote:
>>
>> The issue with Windows is that there is a database at the core of the
>> authentication mechanism, and this database can get damaged. Unix and Linux
>> are essentially based on flat files which can be edited with the correct
>> permissions. It is possible to damage /etc/passwd and/or /etc/shadow in such
>> a way as to cause authentication failure, and also to corrupt your user
>> space in such a way as to damage user configuration files, but it's also a
>> lot easier to recover them.
>>
>> s/
>>
>> Ah. That makes things a bit clearer. Are there any "Howtos" as to how a
>> (relative) newbie can recover from these sorts of damage?
>>
>
> Broadly, make sure you have an up to date backup of /etc/passwd and
> /etc/shadow as well as your home directory.

To do this, I would use

cp /etc/shadow /home/<username>/shadow.bak
cp /etc/passwd /home/<username>/passwd.bak

then archive home

tar -pczf home.tar.gz /home/<myusername>

then move our files onto a USB device

cp /home/home.tar.gz /media/<usb drive name>

I'm sure there are better tutorials out there, but It's something to look at.

-- 
Regards, Kris Douglas.
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