[Sussex] Installing Gentoo - more questions

[John Crowhurst]

> Hi List,
>
> Well, believe it or not, it appears that I have managed to get a basic
> install  of gentoo, but have come across a couple of snags.
>
> Firstly, when I got the installing a bootloader, I did the stuff that
> the  install guide suggests, but when running /sbin/lilo it told me that
> it was  unable to work out which video adapter to use, but it still
> added gentoo and  windows (because of the previous questions that I've
> asked you all, I decided  that it might be better if I installed the
> gentoo stuff first, and just boot  my mandrake install from a floppy -
> which seems to be working!).
>
> Video adapter? is this to do with configuring X or installing nvidia
> drivers  maybe ??

Do you have an onboard video and a seperate video card that you show the
screen on?

> Also, when I was adding passwords for root and user, I went off into
> "cloud  cuckoo land", and just used the ubiquitious mix of numbers,
> letters and  punctuation signs - BUT, like the total nugget that I am, I
> totally forgot  that I was installing with the default US keyboard. And
> of course, if you're  having to blindly follow the install guide,
> because you haven't really got a  clue what you're doing, you set
> complicated passwords before you modify some  of the basic settings in
> /etc/rc.conf (little things like uk.map.gz for the  keyboard setting :?)
> as a result, I'm the nugget who can't log in as either  root or user,
> because I can't find out what the key map equivalent's are  between US
> and UK keyboard settings.

Its always good to use alphanumeric passwords, rather than trying to be
obscure. You just need to make sure that the password you choose isn't a
dictionary word and is a suitable length. Postcodes work well as
passwords, just don't use your current one :P

> Can someone tell me if, and how I would log in as a "single" user so I
> can  allocate a new password to root ? or do you know of any links that
> I can  check/compare so I know what keys I need to actually use to get
> logged in so  I can see if I can then change the respective passwords ??

A lot of distributions have a boot cd, where you can boot from the CD,
then mount the partition and edit the /etc/shadow file. If you change the
root line (usually the top line) to:

root::12180:0:99999:7:::

The root user will have no password set, so you'll need to login (it may
require return to be pressed for the password though)

> More Q's later, as it would probably be better if I got the basic's
> sorted out  first :p
>
> regards
>
> John D.

--
John