On Thu, 2005-01-12 at 21:50 -0500, Claude Jones wrote: > On Thu December 1 2005 9:42 pm, V P wrote: > > On 12/2/05, Claude Jones <claude_jones@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > > Subject line says it all... > > > > I just tried changing the name in /etc/passwd . The system came back > > up on restart and normal users were able to login and do their normal > > stuff, but "su -" failed saying "User root does not exist". Also, > > su-ing the renamed root, admin by "su - admin" didn't work. It didn't > > accept the passwd originally set for root. Probably the the name has > > to be changed in /etc/shadow too. Rebooting into single user mode and > > reverting the changes brought back the system to the initial state. > > The test system was RHEL3AS. > > > > But mikes solution to having a user with root authority is a better > > solution to whatever you are trying to acheive. > > > > I'm not really trying to achieve anything. I'm just curious, and couldn't > readily find the answer. I was hoping to spark a more interesting discussion > than endless dribble about a hapless user from Brazil. And I do appreciate > the responses, so far, and the time you took to experiment - I was a little > worried about trying what you just did. > Why don't you try it, and find out. It may be a good exercise for you to understand how the system is configured. It would also be good if you relayed your findings back to the list as a discussion topic. I am fairly certain that some things are hard coded to give special privileges to "root" by name, and others by UID=0. Like most people on this list, I don't have a good reason to spend time analyzing all the ramifications of changing the username of root, you may have a good reason. I would guess that finding any issues that arise from changing the username from root to anything else, could be considered a "bug". There is no theoretical reason that root username should not be able to be changed, and may through obscurity assist in system security. I don't remember for sure, but I seem to recall the Bastille system hardening package changed root to something else and gave root limited privileges. You may want to look it up and read some of the documentation.
