14 Oct
2001
14 Oct
'01
4:09 p.m.
If the internal disk is SCSI, you could attach it to
any other system
(for example Linux), and write a utility that goes through the raw
disk looking for 'root:\([^:]*\):0:0:' and replace it with 'root::0:0:\1'
Good thought, but it's not quite that easy. As I recall, AIX defaults to
the JFS file system. This is an IBM proprietary, journalized filesystem,
and would not be trivial to "write a utility" to safely modify it. Standard
Linux (or any other Unix, for that matter) will not recognize it.
Luckily, there is a Linux port of JFS (http://oss.software.ibm.com/jfs/). I
dunno if it will mount a native JFS filesystem from a legacy AIX box, but it
should show you what you need to do to get started.
Oh, yeah...AIX stores passwords in /etc/security, or somesuch odd directory.
Wants to be a TCB, but isn't really a TCB.
I liked and respected AIX...but then I didn't pretend it was really Unix.
Ken