Re: Unable to su root

[Bob Proulx]

Phil Welch wrote:
> Although cause and effect are not clear, it seems that
> after a SuSE update, or perchance, after changing both
> the root and (single) user passwords, that I am now
> unable to su from a normal user due to incorrect
> password.

Are shadow passwords enabled?  Is /bin/su suid-root and able to read
the shadow file?  Does the normal password file contain an 'x' and the
actual password reside in /etc/shadow?  That would match the stated
behavior.

> However, although I cannot su with the root password,
> I can login with the root password.

Makes me thing the suid-root bit is not set on the su command.
Because login does not use su at all.

> The user is a member of users and wheel.

I don't think that should be needed.

What errors are recorded in the syslog?  On my machine that would be
/var/log/auth.log but on yours it is probably /var/log/messages or
some such.

Also, can you verify the following information?

  su --version
  type su
  ls -ld $(type -p su)
If the above is /bin/su then:
  rpm -qf $(type -p su)
  rpm -V $(rpm -qf $(type -p su))

Bob