not conneected to network

Hi
Currenly I am using linux operating system. few months ago one of our co-worker left a company. Before he left the company he provided us his user name/password. now the password is expired and we can not able to get in to his account. Also, while he was working on system he had set up back up to our server 2003. SInce the password is expired server is also complaing "can not back linux operating system" can anyone help will appriciate. Thanks

You can't get in touch with this former employee? You should have deleted his account and initiated a new login created by a current employee, when the employee left

You can't get in touch with this former employee? You should have deleted his account and initiated a new login created by a current employee, when the employee left


I can not get in touch with previous employee since he left before I got hire. I talked to admin about the user id/password. Admin is not aware of linux system and he thought password will remain same as long as login id exists... anway.. any other idea?

good admin policies include AGING of all passwords.

You're in a world of hurt here; without the root password, you can not perform
system maintenance.

1) establish a management policy to have all systems admin passwords recorded
by the admin's manager OR at least have some other employee with similar skills
assigned as a backup to every admin!

2) start your planning to kill the system and reinstall -- this will be painful and
carefull planning is a requirement.

I guesss this is the best I can do.. Reinstall the system. Wish me a Luck

two last ditch efforts;

search /etc/passwd and look for any users with group-id '0' (these can login as root)

ask people you think *might* have been given the root password and
ask them to leave an anonymous note on your desk at lunch time.

good admin policies include AGING of all passwords.

You're in a world of hurt here; without the root password, you can not perform
system maintenance.

1) establish a management policy to have all systems admin passwords recorded
by the admin's manager OR at least have some other employee with similar skills
assigned as a backup to every admin!

2) start your planning to kill the system and reinstall -- this will be painful and
carefull planning is a requirement.

Good advice Jobeard... Good luck with this Jason!