Any SCO pros out there? Need to bypass a login...

[ddrueding]

Subject says it all. This was our estimating software last century, and it would be awful nice to get some data out of it. The system (a 450Mhz with 128MB RAM) boots fine, but no one can remember the login details. We aren't even certain about the user name.

Help? Thanks!

 

[Howell]

It has been a long time. What version?

 

[ddrueding]

I don't even know how to tell.

 

[CityK]

Subject says it all. This was our estimating software last century, and it would be awful nice to get some data out of it. The system (a 450Mhz with 128MB RAM) boots fine, but no one can remember the login details. We aren't even certain about the user name.

Help? Thanks!

Why don't you work around the login by booting the system with a boot disk (like a systemrescue type), mount the partition(s), copy the data off them, and then view it later in the system of your choice?

 

[ddrueding]

That would be a great idea if it weren't for the fact that all the data is in a proprietary format that only the software on this machine can read.

 

[Howell]

Do you have the install media?

 

[ddrueding]

Nope.

 

[Mercutio]

Which SCO? Unixware? What version?

The deeply sucky thing is that there were a bunch of goofy proprietary filesystems that exist on SCO and no place else, but Linux and FreeBSD can mount some drives that were used on SCO systems.

 

[Chewy509]

http://aplawrence.com/Unixart/lost_root_password.html

 

[CityK]

http://aplawrence.com/Unixart/lost_root_password.html

Yeah, he's got some other stuff that might come in handy if you need to do further work on this system:

http://aplawrence.com/Linux/scolindiff.html

Here is another link that has a little bit of useful info about the bootloader
http://www.linuxmisc.com/1-linux-setup/8f7beb2da5868820.htm

(I was looking to see if there was any quick google hits about the SCO bootloader maybe having some basic set of commands like grub does, in hope of maybe getting around the password or look/peak into the filesystem)

 

[Mercutio]

My thinking was that it would probably be more productive to drop the source drive in a Linux system and find some way to mount and edit the FS than to screw around with SCO's primitive and poorly-documented crap.

I haven't touched anything SCO in around 10 years but even back then I remember that Unixware was surpassed in every possible way by Linux and *BSD, even documentation. Even as half-assed as Solaris x86 was, it was a better deal too.

 

[ddrueding]

I'm not disagreeing with any of the opinions of SCO here. Unfortunately the data is in a proprietary format that can only be opened by the program that is only installed on this machine. I don't have any copies of the OS or application. Of course, all the companies involved are long gone.

If I were to get access to the filesystem could I see or update the username/password file in some way?

 

[Mercutio]

Yup. And if the version of SCO is old enough, you can directly modify the contents of /etc/passwd, too.

 

[Handruin]

Any chance this System Rescue CD distro might help? I use it to repartition drives on VMs all the time because it's a bootable ISO. Maybe it will give you access to the drives you need to run commands and get access to the files.

 

[ddrueding]

Any chance this System Rescue CD distro might help? I use it to repartition drives on VMs all the time because it's a bootable ISO. Maybe it will give you access to the drives you need to run commands and get access to the files.

Downloading it now. So to see/modify the usernames and passwords I'll need to do the following:

1. Mount the hard drive somehow?
2. Browse to /etc/passwd
3. Edit it in some way?

Does that sound like a plan?

 

[Chewy509]

exactly... Some newer versions use /etc/shadow to hold the password as well.

http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/understanding-etcpasswd-file-format/
http://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/understanding-etcshadow-file/