Greetings,

whenever I log in as root when I'm sitting in front of the box I do not have any problems, but I'm unable to connect as root remotely... not even if I log in with a normal user... and then try to SU
I'm using a fresh and clean installation of RH8. any idea?

Thank you!

Hello,

I always have that problem. You need to log in directly as root and not login as a subuser without root status. You could possibily change the settings on this as I know some systems have been changed so logging in as a specific subuser is required before you can even login as root. That feature is for additional security.

Just add that normal user to the wheel group. Just open /etc/group then add this user.

pico /etc/group

then you will find the line of the wheel group, something like

wheel:x:10:root

just make it something like

wheel:x:10:root, folan

where 'folan' is the normal user

then login using this user and su and you will gain root access.

hope this helps.

THank you,
I've tryied but still I could'nt su as root :(
Any other idea?

Did it ask you for the root password? did you get any error messages?

Not being able to ssh as root is not a problem, it is smart setting in sshd_config

PermitRootLogin no

You can change it to yes if you realy want to and restart sshd for it to take effect.

Thk you Sasha, but sshd_config is ok, root login are allowed, but still I cannot su :'(

Nozol, yes it says bad password and make me return to the user from where I give su command.

;(

Strange. Then check the password of the root user.

passwd root

Also try to issue the command

su root

instead of

su

Nozol thank you very much, with passwd many things was changed. Now I'm able to connect via ssh, and login as root or give su command, but now I could'nt login on tty (directly on the keyboard of my linux box) as root, only as normal user, and still I could'nt su (from local), this is really really strange :(

This is strange!!!

Please check the file /etc/securetty, see if root still has access to the console.

chmod +s `which su`
should help

Nozol, this is my /etc/securetty content:

vc/1
vc/2
vc/3
vc/4
vc/5
vc/6
vc/7
vc/8
vc/9
vc/10
vc/11
tty1
tty2
tty3
tty4
tty5
tty6
tty7
tty8
tty9
tty10
tty11

It is wrong?

Originally posted by Miha
chmod +s `which su`
should help

Thank Miha,
but I did'nt understood, can you explain it to me pls?

I've found this file interesting, (I din't find it in my previous installation of redhat 7.2) but seems that everithing is commented here. can be usefull?

Originally posted by MasterBrian
Nozol, this is my /etc/securetty content:

vc/1
vc/2
vc/3
vc/4
vc/5
vc/6
vc/7
vc/8
vc/9
vc/10
vc/11
tty1
tty2
tty3
tty4
tty5
tty6
tty7
tty8
tty9
tty10
tty11

It is wrong?

This is correct.

It may sound strange, but, let's try

passwd root

from ssh this time, let see what happens.

Originally posted by MasterBrian


Thank Miha,
but I did'nt understood, can you explain it to me pls?

That means it will setup 'suid' bit on the su executable. If it is not suid from root, then you can't login to root via su. That's what you were/are getting, you can execute 'su' but it is saying that bad passwd.

Ok, I've done it:

Changing password for user root.
New password:
Retype new password:
passwd: all authentication tokens updated successfully.

Ops, maybe I've found (thank Nozol) the problem, I've the password setup with some special characters, if I make a normal password (only with letters from A to Z) the logins work from both ssh and local, maybe I've setup a wrong keyboard driver on my linux box?

great, thank God!!

May be just install a normal 101 key, keyboard driver.

Thank you very much Nozol, sorry for this problem :)

How I can check/change keyboard driver? (I'm not sure about this)

You are most welcome :)

Here is how to do it,

1- open /etc/sysconfig/keyboard
2- Make sure only the following is in it

KEYBOARDTYPE="pc"
KEYTABLE="us"

3- restart keytable

/etc/rc.d/init.d/keytable restart


That's it, wish you all the best!

Thank you nozol, this solve my problem but I didn't use an US keyboard :|

BTW, thank you again ;)