Root password reset on VMware Identity Manager 3.3.x

Products

• VMware Aria Suite

Issue/Introduction

Unable to reset root account password 

Environment

VMware Identity Manager 3.3.x

Cause

When root account gets locked due to numerous wrong password attempt or if /var partition on the appliance is full

Resolution

Prerequisites

• You have valid snapshots or backups of the node(s) participating in the cluster.

Procedure:

Follow below procedure for GRUB version 2.0 and above:

1. Restart VMware Identity Manager appliance and wait for the Photon OS Splash screen during boot.

2. Enter 'e' to go to GNU GRUB boot menu editor:

3. In the GNU GRUB editor, enter "rw init=/bin/bash" at the end of the line that begins with linux.

4. Click the F10 key to push your change and restart the appliance.

5. Mount the / partition as RW with mount -o rw,remount / and reset the root password with the passwd command:

6. Validate the root account is not locked out and unlock if necessary:

To check the status of root account:

pam_tally2 -u root

If root account is locked, run:

pam_tally2 -u root --reset

7. Reboot the appliance with " reboot -f " command.

 

Follow below Procedure for GRUB version 0.97:

To reset root account password from single user mode

1. Reboot the appliance from vCenter server console view and press p  or e when you see bootloader 
2. You will be prompted for password. Enter the password as H0rizon! and enter
3. You will have different options select the first option and enter e to execute
4. From the available options select boot option starting with Kernel and select e to execute 
5. You will be on editor page add the following value and hit enter rw init=/bin/bash

6. You will be back to the previous list with boot option starting with Kernel select press b key
7. You will be booted into single user mode and following command can be used to reset root password
     passwd root
8. Reboot the appliance using reboot -f command to check the root login again