Digital Ocean

1

This was asked elsewhere but I think it a good topic for here

Any of you guys that use servers like digital ocean or one of the others… There’s something I don’t quite understand. If I use an SSH key to access the server, does my root account have a regular unix password too? I probably wasn’t paying attention if I set one initially.

Anyone ?

2

Yes, there should still be a root pw so that you can use sudo from a non-root account.

Only that sshd is configured not to let you login remotely with passwords but only with the ssh key.

Ah, nonsense what I wrote above. I just checked myself:

Correct is:

  1. When you use sudo, you enter not the root pw but your current user account’s pw.
  2. I cannot find any root pw written down for my DO instances. So there may not be one at all.
3

When you create the droplet you have the option to choose between SSH keys and Password:

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4

A root password is not always needed with sudo access. Most sshd servers are configured to not allow any root-with-password logins. One of the recovery options will shutdown the droplet, install a random root password, and then email that password to you. Then you can access root via the droplet console (not ssh) from the control panel.

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