I'm pretty sure I read an email from Danny saying he/she was a noob.
I can't find a tclug list archive to verify that, though....

At the very least we should not ask a novice user to use vim to mess with a
shadow file. That's just brutal.

If the command
    mount -o rw,remount /

works for them, then the user can just run
    passwd danny
to change the password for the "danny" user.

Here's a perfect video:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3rbpR9uuHA

Gerry



--
gsker at skerbitz.org

On Sun, 30 Dec 2018, harv wrote:

>
> Sat, 29 Dec 2018 19:39:30 -0600
>> Date: Sat, 29 Dec 2018 14:03:28 -0600
>> From: Danny Johnson <bunjee50 at gmail.com>
>> To: TCLUG Mailing List <tclug-list at mn-linux.org>
>> Subject: [tclug-list] change password
>> Message-ID:
>> 	<CANa+X+v175fJUbDkGzq31aNWdvYFt-ujU1wygjxeiW6fA97hHA at mail.gmail.com>
>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
>>
>> Hello!
>> I can't get in to my terminal because it will not recognize my password.
>> I am using Ubuntu 18.04.
>> All was well then - BAMM!!!
>> Really frustrating.
>> Please advise.
>>
>> Dan J.
>> Newbie
>
> I don't use ubuntu but this has worked on every other distro I have
> used.
> You could try this.
> At the grub boot menu you should see:
>
> Ubuntu
> Ubuntu Advanced Options
>
> Look under Advanced options for 'single user mode' or 'recovery console'
> or similar. If available boot into that and skip down to "You should
> now be in a console..."
>
> If one of those is not available then go back to main menu and type e
> to edit command line.
> Look for line starting with either 'linux' or 'kernel' and add this to
> end of line:
>
> init=/bin/sh
>
> then allow to boot.
>
> You should now be in a console with a prompt.
> Type mount
> Look for line in output that says:
> /dev/sda* on / ... (rw ...)
> or
> <uuid on> / ... (rw ...)  <- uuid looks like random characters
>
> The important part here is the (rw ...) part. If it says 'ro' instead
> of 'rw' you'll have to remount the file system as writable
>
> mount -o remount,rw /
>
> Then type
>
> vi /etc/shadow
>
> If vi is not available try vim.
> Look for line with your user name and use arrow keys to put cursor
> under first character in second field
>
> dan:jflsjfljfslleie:::
>       ^
> then use the 'x' key to delete everything to next colon.
> type
> :wq
> to exit vi/vim
>
> Reboot
> Login with no password  and then set a new one.
>
> hth
> _______________________________________________
> TCLUG Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota
> tclug-list at mn-linux.org
> http://mailman.mn-linux.org/mailman/listinfo/tclug-list
>