HOW TO: Enabling root on a new server?

[Vince]

Amusing to hear they are more secure on FreeBSD than linux although its
a shame that didnt work for you. They didnt enable you to use sudo
instead of su or something like that did they?
	I'm afraid i cant recommend any FreeBSD hosting companies though
personal experience, (work only does linux and windows,) but i'm sure an
ask on or a search of the archives of the freebsd-questions@ ,
freebsd-net@ or freebsd-isp@ lists will throw up some suggestions.


Vince

Michael Williams wrote:
> First, the output of the grep is:
> 
> root:*:0:0:Charlie &:/root:/bin/csh
> toor:*:0:0:Bourne-again Superuser:/root:
> daemon:*:1:1:Owner of many system processes:/root:/usr/sbin/nologin
> 
> 
> . . .that said, the Plesk Module Loader only allows for ".tgz" and
> ".tbz" files and is anal about them being of a "module" format, whatever
> structure may be.  I've tried what I thought were appropriate modules,
> and it rejected them saying they were not true modules.
> 
> I'm going to call one more time today.  If I get no better assistance, I
> will seek out a different company.  If you all have any recommendations
> let me know.  Obviously, the best solution would be to have my ISP set
> me up with a static IP and massive amounts of bandwidth.  But, seeing as
> how that's at least a good 30 years off. . .
> 
> Regards,
> Michael
> 
> 
> On Jul 16, 2007, at 11:03 AM, Vince wrote:
> 
>> For most versions of plesk i've come across (I look after a load of
>> linux servers with it installed,) if you have the plesk admin then you
>> have root. Look for the modules option, then look for the add modules,
>> this should let you upload a shell script which is then run as root
>> (horribly insecure but thats plesk, and if you fiddle with their setting
>> enough you can change the css of the webapp not to display the page) If
>> this is the same on FreeBSD as on linux you can create a new UID 0 user
>> if need be using pw in a shell script, or you can put a ssh public key
>> in to roots authorized_keys file. I'd definitely advise you get plesk
>> removed if you intend to administrate the box by hand though.
>>
>>     If thats no help, when you log into the box by ssh, what is the
>> output of
>> grep root /etc/passwd
>> it should be something like
>> root:*:0:0:Charlie &:/root:/bin/csh
>> if not then they have renamed/removed root so try looking in /etc/passwd
>>  for a user with uid of 0 (third field.)
>> This should at least get you a username to ask their support about. If
>> they have actually removed the root user your a bit stuffed and
>>
>> Hope some of thats some help.
>>
>> Vince
>>
>>
>>
>> Michael Williams wrote:
>>> Tom,
>>>
>>> Again, Plesk just came with the server config we asked for.  We didn't
>>> ask for Plesk, we *asked* for the specific hardware.  Plesk was "free".
>>> *rolls eyes*
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Michael
>>>
>>> On Jul 16, 2007, at 3:17 AM, Tom Samplonius wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> ----- "Michael Williams" <gberz3 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> No,  I don't necessarily need Plesk; although we will be selling
>>>>> hosting.  It simply came with the default configuration for the
>>>>> server.  My plan is to manage most everything from the Unix shell.  I
>>>>>
>>>>> just figured I might find a morsel inside Plesk somewhere for
>>>>> enabling root access.  FYI, logging in as admin didn't work.  Any
>>>>> other suggestions?
>>>>
>>>>   You are probably better off just asking the hosting company for the
>>>> password.  You need the root password, and you need to have an account
>>>> that is a member of the wheel group (use "groups" when you ssh to see
>>>> if your account is ok).
>>>>
>>>>   They might have flagged you as a newbie, and think you are better
>>>> off inside the padded confines of Plesk.  I work at a hosting company,
>>>> and a whole bunch of our dedicated server customers are in over their
>>>> heads with their servers as it is.  Given that you asked for Plesk,
>>>> and are now asking for root, they are probably has made them worried
>>>> that the next call from you will be that you deleted /etc, and  your
>>>> server won't boot anymore.
>>>>
>>>>   If you are planning to do any admin via ssh with root, you will not
>>>> want Plesk.  Plesk manages all of your software installs.  Plesk
>>>> includes Plesk specific versions of Apache, PHP, and MySQL.  All
>>>> patches and updates can only come from SWSoft, or the Plesk universe
>>>> will crash.  And Plesk ties you to a specific FreeBSD version too.
>>>> Plesk versions lag big time for FreeBSD.  But on the other hand, it is
>>>> big GUI thing, and people like it.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Tom
>>>
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>>