A way to mess up recovery mode logins! Comments please?

[Derek Broughton]

neil woolford wrote:

> First of all, follow the instructions on the RootSudo wiki page to
> temporarily set a root password, then follow the instructions to disable
> that password.
> 
> so;
> 
> sudo passwd root
> 
> then;
> 
> sudo passwd -l root
> 
> Now try rebooting into recovery mode.  You will be asked for a root
> password, but even if you give it, you won't be able to log in as it has
> been disabled and the root account is now locked.  (Time to break out
> the Damn Small Linux disc when it happened to me!)
> 
> Why does this happen?
 
Because you've disabled root.

> Unless others can see a reason not to do so, I intend to add this
> information to the wiki.  I'm also considering a bug report as it
> *might* be worth amending the patch to the recovery mode boot, to allow
> the same behaviour for a locked root password as currently exists for a
> null one.

I'm all in favor of adding it to the wiki, but really if you disable root,
don't you want it disabled?  I don't consider this a bug.

I really think you'll find exactly the same thing happens in Debian if you
use a null password instead of a locked one.
-- 
derek