HMC and root login (on POWER5)

[strus]

Hi all,
How can I do to copy files in a directory of the HMC where only root user has access ??
Please no flip/flop solution, if it is possible I would like an ssh connection ...
Today, I only get access by using the hscroot user ...
The "su -" is forbiden and I have no idea of the root password ... (I think IBM blocks it .????)
Thanks.

 

[DukeSSD]

Yes, IBM blocks root access, you will have to apply to IBM for a password, with a good reason. The password will only last for 1 day.

 

[ogniemi]

the solution is to create different user with uid 0 and change his shell to ksh instead of bash.

 

[Mag0007]

to create a different user you need to be root

Chicken or the egg?

 

[AIX5L]

Hi

There are some Backdoors to gain root-access, but i don't say it......;->
Because IBM will close this then also.

The official Way
You can create an hmcpe user and your IBM Supoort can generate the Passwort with your Serial Number for you to gain root Access.

 

[p5wizard]

Back to your original question - why do you want to copy files to the HMC. This is basically not a good idea, because after applying fixes to the HMC code, you may well have lost all the files you placed there...

Consider it a black box which manages your p5 server(s) and nothing else.

You do not want to play around with it because you need it to activate partitions and do dynamic LPAR stuff... Also call home for the managed p5 servers runs through the HMC.

That being said - yes I too have a way to access root account - a simple df needs root access. I can't imagine why they left that out of hscroot's reach.


HTH,

p5wizard

 

[strus]

Well, to be honest I too have a way to be root but to do this I need a direct access to the HMC and I want to do it remotely.

p5wizard, I know what you said on risk, but this is not a problem, this is a test only configuration and I can re-install it when I want ...
To be more precise I want to modify some files on the hmc.
(note that for me the hmc is not a blackbox).

 

[p5wizard]

Well if you know how to become root, albeit on the box itself, then it shouldn't be too difficult to modify the hscroot restricted environment so that you change to root even from the hscroot ssh session...

HTH,

p5wizard

 

[hfaix]

I don't understand why anyone would want to mess with the HMC. I view it as an appliance..... I always want it to work, and I always want it supported, therefore I'll leave it like I got it.

 

[CrystalWizard]

easy, non-supported way to do what you want:

boot off a linux CD

not supported, will void your warrenty and probably any support contracts you have, but it'll get you full access.

 

[CrystalWizard]

incidently, once you're booted to a full shell like that, just change the .cshrc and you'll have full shell access all the time.

Guarenteed if you do that and then try to talk to support, you'll be told you're in a non-supported configuration.

 

[gower]

Apparently, when you get the root password for the day you can simply enable Telnet which will give you root access.

I haven't tried this myself yet, so anybody who gets the chance please let us know if it works.

 

[CrystalWizard]

it works.

 

[strus]

p5wizard, the problem is not to gain root access remotely after passing root.
In fact, I wanted to know if there was a method to be root just with a command. For the IOserver for example you can by entering the command set_oem_env or something similar.
Is there an equivalant for the HMC ? or a secret login ?
That's all I want to know.

For hfaix, the WSM application which is on the HMC is something that I don't like (especially when you access it remotely because it often hangs, or disconnect) ...
So, I have made a perl script which gives me all needed information about my configuration with a command line.
The issue is that for some command I would appreciate to be root on the HMC.
This kind of script is useful to know for example the blocking point of the network traffic when you use vitual ethernet for example, or the state of all the disks on your Power5 without having to click a lot of times on multiples windows ...

 

[CrystalWizard]

nope there is not. The developers have turned the HMC into a black box. they do NOT want you to have root access. If you want root access, you have to gain it either through the pepasscode which is good for only 24 hours or do something else.

There are several suggestions for something else already posted.

Those are your only options.

 

[p5wizard]

>In fact, I wanted to know if there was a method to be
>root just with a command. For the IOserver for example
>you can by entering the command set_oem_env or something
>similar.
>Is there an equivalant for the HMC ? or a secret login ?

No there isn't, but if you know how to gain root access the hard way, the sky's the limit - make a secret "set_oem_env" for yourself.

That's the last I'm going to say on this...

HTH,

p5wizard

 

[rzs0502]

I was curious about this as well as I needed more control on the HMC to automate profile data backups etc.
Since the HMC runs SuSE, could it not be booted into single user mode with Grub/Lilo to access to sneak in a few root-only commands?


"If you always do what you've always done, you will always be where you've always been."

 

[CrystalWizard]

yes it could

if you have a support contract and you do that, you'll void your contract and become unsupported.