Removing my user account password

[snivlle]

Hello friends:

I'm running Mandrake 8; I would like to remove the password for my "user account". Can someone please tell me how I make my user account "password-less". I've tried simply changing the current password to a "null string" but I get the ambiguous message " Incorrect login". When I install Mandrake, it allows me the opportunity to create accounts without a password; I would like to know how to do it for myself.

Any knowledgeable advice will be greatly appreciated.

[Craig McPherson]

Run "passwd username" as root, then press ENTER when prompted for the new password. Since it's a weak password, you'll have to do it three times.

Alternately, you can edit /etc/shadow, and delete the user's hashed password.

IE if it looks like this:

username:$1$OiwuEVIK$gc3hOj7fCrOZwjWd2IfD20:11446: 0:99999:7:::

chance it to this:

username::11446:0:99999:7:::

When logging in, just press enter for the password.

It's possible you have PAM configured not to allow logins from users with blank passwords, and SSH has an option to not allow users with blank passwords, so check your configurations there.

I guess I don't have to tell you that if you do this, you'll get h4x0r3d sooner or later.

[snivlle]

Thank you Craig. :-)

I've copied and pasted the text of your reply into a text document for future reference. I will be sure to give it a whirl.