Note: For information on using vi, see the vi man pages.
Note: The preceding link was correct as of August 18, 2014. If you find the link is broken, provide feedback and a VMware employee will update the link.
Locate the entry similar to:
root:x:0:0:root:/root:/sbin/nologin
Change this entry to:
root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
Save and close the file.
Log out from vMA and log in again as the vi-admin user.
Run this command and enter the new root password:
sudo passwd root You should now be able to log in to vMA using the root account.