Root's User ID (i messed this up please help!)

[flipjargendy]

I have change the User id of root in Kubuntu. Now when i try to open anything like 'Adept' or any other things that would change system settings it tells me that certain files are not writable. Even when i'm on my regular user trying to change something. When i try to use 'su' all it says is "Sorry!". i cannot change anything back now. Is there anything i can do?

Is there any way to get back to the old settings when it worked? i'm not super great with Unix and don't know all of the options i have. i cannot write to most files. What can i do?

Thanks in advance.

[jledhead]

how did you change the root userID?

have you tried sudo <command here>

[vidd]

you can try running (in terminal or command line) the command
su base-config
to get the file systems and root permissions reset

And if that does not work, you can try resetting root's password (not sure how under KDE - I use gnome), open a virtual terminal (<CTLR> <ALT><F1 or F2, or ...F7>) log in as root and try
base-config

As a last resort, you can back up all your data files and do a clean install

[flipjargendy]

i've tried what you said but no go. It tells me that permission is denied. Dang, right after i reninstalled from messing it up before.

i've changed the user id using KUser, KDE's user/group editor it looks like. i don't know if that makes a difference. i'll wait a bit before i reinstall though, maybe someone else has another suggestion.

Thanks Guys

[Cabhan]

Hrmm...

Well, the UID is stored in /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow, assuming that you use the latter. Unfortunately, to edit them, you need root privileges.

Try downloading Knoppix (or indeed, any LiveCD, but I recommend Knoppix), and mount your hard drive under it. From there, modify the files to change root's UID back to 0.

The format of these files is:

user:x:UID:GID:comments:home directory:login shell

In /etc/passwd, there is an 'x' in the second field. In /etc/shadow, there is an encrypted password there.

Change the UID for root to 0 (zero) in both of them and see if that works.

[flipjargendy]

Ok, i'm running knoppix and the partitions on my harddrive were mounted automatically. The problem now is that hda1 (my Kubuntu partition) is read write despite my changing the hard drive to read & write for all groups and users and i've even unchecked the checkbox that makes the drive read-only. How do i get around this?