RE: [cobalt-users] [RaQx] Admin access no Root

[Sales - Way to the Web <sales@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello,

A preventative idea...

> > We have a RaQ2 that has been running for over a year 
> without any problems. No sites have been added in the last 5 months.
> > After a reboot this afternoon I am able to gain admin 
> access via telnet, but after typing 'su -l' and using the same admin
> > password it denied me access to root. I even went into the 
> gui and changed the admin password. Still unable to gain root
> > access, but able to gain admin and gui access.
> 
> telnet in as admin and do a df -u  check and see if /var is 
> at 100%, it
> sounds like this is your problem.  What you will need to do 
> if that is the
> case is in the archives and in the cobalt knowledgebase.  In 
> fact i have to do it tonight.  :/

It's of no use whatsoever for those already in this situation, but I've
decided upon some prevention (as opposed to cure) for this particular ill
and it may be something others might consider:

So that we never get into this situation ourselves, I've done the following:
0. Check the size of the /var partition first (df) and then locate some
large irrelevant files
1. TELNET in as admin and SU to root
2. Create a directory in /var for the admin account:
mkdir /var/admintmp
3. Set the ownership for the admin account:
chown admin:admin /var/admintmp
4. <CTRL-D> back to the admin account and now copy (cp) some large files
into the new /var/admintmp/ directory (I've given us 9MB of data)
5. Double check that they're owned by admin:
ls -la /var/admintmp

NOTE: Make sure you don't fill up the /var partition yourself in doing this
and leave plenty of room for normal log file expansion.

It's a bit messy, but at least this way should the /var partition become
100% full you can login as admin, delete the files in /var/admintmp and then
(su) to root and clear down (or move/compress - mv/gzip) some log files and
sort out the problem in a more controlled manner.

Regards,
Jonathan Michaelson

Way to the Web Ltd
Commercial CGI Scripting, Web Hosting
http://www.waytotheweb.com