Oracle Solaris 11 x64 root password?

Question

I have installed OS 11 x64 on a pc to evaluate if this could be my new system for a home storage array of 48TB. I have a very basic problem: I somehow cannot access root with the admin password created at the install. I am currently logged in as admin@solaris but in order to configure zfs, etc, I need root access. How can reset the root passwd or simply remove it temporarily? Thanks, Dan

Answer 1

You can no more log in as root with Solaris 11 as, by default, root is not an account but a role. Just use sudo from your initial user login account if your need root privileges, eg

$ sudo -i

Should you want to revert root to its traditional (but less secure) non role setting, you can run:

# rolemod -K type=normal root

Answer 2

Here is another way to do it:

1) Boot from the text install DVD (or ISO file if your Solaris 11 installation is in a VM)

2) Make sure you boot into single user mode: at the initial GRUB screen, press Esc, then press 'e' to edit the Grub command line, add the switch '-s' for single-user boot

3) After booting into single-user mode, log in as 'root', the password is 'solaris'

4) Mount the ZFS root pool. Most HOWTOs recommend creating only the directory /a, this is not enough, you need two directories, we use /a/b in the following example. Also the -f flag (force) is important in the zpool import command.

mkdir -p /a/b
zpool import -f -R /a rpool
zfs set mountpoint=/b rpool/ROOT/solaris
zfs mount rpool/ROOT/solaris

5) Edit the file /a/b/etc/shadow, you may need to make it writable first. Find the row with root's entry, it is usually the first. Delete the password hash between the first and second colons, so the line now looks like root::12345:::::: (your number may be different).

6) Edit /a/b/etc/user_attr by commenting out the line root::::type=role. This makes root a "normal user" which is not recommended BTW.

7) Edit /a/b/etc/default/login by commenting out the line PASSREQ=YES. This will ensure that no password is required when logging in as root.

8) Reset the root mountpoint by issuing the commands

zfs set mountpoint=/ rpool/ROOT/solaris
zpool export rpool

The first command will complain about being unable to mount 'a' because the directory is not empty, cannot remount etc. Ignore this and reboot. You should be able to log in as root without a password.