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Pacman has just generated a new /etc/shadow.pacnew. I am not entirely sure how to reconcile this with the old. The pacnew file only has one entry root:*: My question is should I diff this new entry to my old shadow file or keep the old entry (which means I can practically just delete the pacnew)?
Last edited by d_fajardo (2020-05-13 10:59:43)
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https://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/understan … adow-file/
Is "root:*:" the correct line for your shadow?
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The file /etc/shadow is part of the filesystem package.
It contains "some" default users that each Linux system must have (speaking of the packaged file here!).
I.e. root.
Of course the standard package does not know which password the end user wants to set for their system's root user.
Hence the root's default passwort hash is an asterisk to never match any possible password hash.
So unless you want to disable login for your root user (Ubuntu-style), you should not replace the /etc/shadow entry with the one from the pacnew file.
Last edited by schard (2020-05-13 08:46:47)
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Is "root:*:" the correct line for your shadow?
No it's not.
Thanks to you both, that clarified things.
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If you have set root password already then you dont need to do anything. Just delete shadow.pacnew file.
If you have not set the root password then it is advisable to change your "root::" line to "root:*:" in your shadow file. (unless you want to continue without setting a password)
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I wondered about that, too. Found this:
Warning: Arch Linux defaults of the files are created as .pacnew files by new releases of the filesystem package. Unless Pacman outputs related messages for action, these .pacnew files can, and should, be disregarded/removed. New required default users and groups are added or re-added as needed by systemd-sysusers(8) or the package install script.
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