[ale] howto force "give root password" prompt

[brian at polibyte.com]

On Thu, 10 Dec 2009 11:46:03 -0600, "John G. Heim" <jheim at math.wisc.edu>
wrote:
> I have a problem with a vmware virtual machine. It's running
debian/lenny. 
> After a power failure, it tends to not boot. It ssits at a prompt saying,

> "Give root password for maintenance (or type control-D for normal
startup."
> 
> I need to be able to get past this prompt if I'm not in the physical 
> presence  of the machine. I can log into the vmware server and hard boot
> it. 
> But it comes up the same way. There is a vmware command for answering 
> console questions. But I don't know if it will work. Other than pulling
the
> 
> plug, how can I test it? I want to somehow make it come up with that
prompt
> 
> to see if the vmware answer command will let me get past it.
> 
> 
> So this is not really a vmware question. It's just a linux question. What

> causes a linux machine to come up asking if you want to enter maintenance

> mode and can I artificially reproduce those conditions?

I believe this is the prompt Debian displays when the system is booted into
single user mode (i.e. runlevel S or 1) and there is a root password. If
you enter the root password init will stop at runlevel 1. If you type
control-D init will continue booting to the default runlevel. If there is
no root password, I believe you will not see this prompt. Instead, init
will just boot to 1.

To test this, just add 'single' or '1' to the end of the kernel line in
your bootloader's menu. More details on how to do that at
http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/linux/RHL-9-Manual/ref-guide/s1-grub-runlevels.html

All the best,
Brian Pitts