Hi,
If I want to move a bunch of users from a Redhat 6.2 box to a Redhat 7.3 box, first I tar.gz up their home directories, and copy it across and unexpand it in /home. That deals with the files. I recurse ownerships/permissions when tarring.
Then, to make sure permissions are all OK, I duplicate the entries in the /etc/passwd file from the original box, on the new box making sure userid numbers match up (and thus all ownerships/permissions are OK).
Now, I could just passwd all these new users and reissue all users with new passwords, but this looks a bit unprofessional TBH. How can I migrate the data from the shadow file on the old box to the shadow file on the new box? I believe the authentication methods have changed slightly between 6.2 and 7.3.
If it used old style unix passwords in the /etc/passwd file I assume I could just copy the passwd file across, but I think shadow is a bit more ... er.. tricky? Perhaps it's not and I'm fussing about nothing.
It's amazing there is no howto about this sigh...
Answers on a postcard ;)
AJ.
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A little simplification would be to run pwunconv on the old machine (this would get you a nice "old style" /etc/passwd :), copy the passwd file to the new machine and thean run pwconv on the new machine. So you will get back the shadow file (now probably encrypted with MD5, see jlevie's comment).
I think you're fussing about nothing ;)
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by: jleviePosted on 2002-10-01 at 20:37:32ID: 7311459
Your 6.2 box might have been using DES encryption for the passwords, in which case the first two characters of each password will be random characters (MD5 encrypted passwords start with $1$). But it doesn't matter which form of encryption was used. Simply create the entries in the 7.3 shadow file from the data on the 6.2 box. I always match up the accounts line for line with what is in the password file as I've had problems on occasion when that's not the case. RedHat is quite happy to use either or both forms of encryption within a shadow file. It can tell which is which and acts accordingly.
The default in modern Linux systems is to use MD5. Unless you've changed that any new accounts created on the 7.3 box or any passwords that are changed will be encrypted with MD5.