Reset Lost Password in Linux

Lost?

On some of my servers I only login once a quarter maybe.  On these machines I've had to recover my password many times, and here's the quick process I use.

The Process

This process only works if your system has Grub as its boot loader (you can also do this with lilo and most others, but you will have to check elsewhere to see how to do it).

1. Reboot the box

2. At the grub loader type 'e'

3. Press 'e' once more once in the next screen

4. On the line that begins with 'kernel' add the word 'single' to the end (this will boot the box to single user mode).

5. Type 'b' to boot to single user mode

6. Change your password with 'passwd'

7. Reboot again let it boot regularly

8. Login with new password

 I hope this is useful for someone!