This is a feature of pretty much every PC out there. If you boot off of
another disk you can do what you like. Every mac out there is bootable by
CD. You can burn an OS 9 disk, boot off of it, and do whatever you like.
You can replace the local netinfo database with your own copy, and now you
have your own root user. On a PC, you can set the BIOS password to prevent
this.
With the latest firmware update, you can also set a boot password on recent
macs. There isn't a TIL yet, but it has been discussed on the
darwin-development list at some length - you can search the archives at
www.darwinfo.org.
Ian
On 3/30/01 1:37 PM, "Michael Stearne" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> That is a crazy feature of OS X I think. You can just walk up to a box
> with OS X on it with an install CD, reset the password and have free
> reign? That sounds a little dangerous.
>
> Michael
>
>
> On Friday, March 30, 2001, at 02:08 PM, Bill Stephenson wrote:
>
>> on 3/30/01 12:37 PM, Farrukh Zaidi at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>>
>>> I had the same problem with not being able to su to root. What I did
>>> was use NetInfo Manager, which comes with OS X, to delete the password
>>> for root. Then I could su to root without being prompted for a
>>> password
>>> and use the unix command "passwd" to set a new password for root.
>>
>> I reset the root password by restarting with the OSX installer CD-ROM
>> and
>> choosing "Reset Password" from the menu. This tip is in the OS X user
>> guide.
>>
>> It takes a really long time to do this though. I like Farrukh's method
>> better ;-)
>> --
