The mangOH board comes with an empty (or unset) root password. This is great for development work on the bench - but not so good when you ship your project out into the big bad world.
Password tips
Set the root password to be a strong password that is unique to each board. Some tips1 for a secure password are:
- Make the password length reasonably long (8-12 characters)
- Use a mix of uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers and symbols
- Don't use personal/company information or common words
- Try not to use information that could 'leak' from the device (such as MAC or IP addresses) as the whole password
- If you have more than one device in your 'fleet', don't use a common password across all devices
and
- Keep your passwords secure
- Have a password backup strategy in place
Note:
Passwords (and filenames for that matter) on the mangOH are CaSe SeNsItIvE.
So fred
, Fred
and FRED
are all different passwords.
To change the root password
Changing the root password is straight forward.
Warning:
DO NOT FORGET OR LOSE THE ROOT PASSWORD
If you forget or lose the root password, you WILL be locked out of the mangOH board. The only way to recover from a lost password is to completely re-flash the mangOH board with a factory default image - and this will destroy all applications and data present on the board.
You have been warned!
- log into the mangOH board as
root
using ssh or via the serial console use the
passwd
command to change the password~# passwd Changing password for root Enter the new password (minimum of 5 characters) Please use a combination of upper and lower case letters and numbers. New password: Re-enter new password: passwd: password changed. ~#
If the password doesn't meet the default complexity you will be prompted to change your password - but you will be able to use a weak password anyway
~# passwd Changing password for root Enter the new password (minimum of 5 characters) Please use a combination of upper and lower case letters and numbers. New password: Bad password: too short. Warning: weak password (enter it again to use it anyway). New password: Re-enter new password: passwd: password changed. ~#
Before logging out, open another ssh console and try to log in using the new password
And it's as easy as that.
See Creating a strong password and Tips for Strong, Secure Passwords for futher recommendations about passwords.↩