Oops--I thought I was sending clarifying posts to the list, but actually
they were going to individuals. So I assumed some people had information
that they didn't.
I completely forgot to say that I'd tried passwd, too. But I can't do it
as Postgres, because I don't know the original password. And if I log in
as root and say "passwd postgres", it has the exact same bug as with
Linuxconf/Userconf. I enter the new password once, then the second time,
hit enter, and it just hangs. After a few moments it says
"Passwd: Critical error - immediate abort" and goes back to the root
prompt.
And, when I look in shadow.... unlike 'nobody' et al., Postgres doesn't
have the * --it has a long string of gibberish, indicating that it
*does* have a password. And my brother, who installed Red Hat with the
Postgres RPM in the first place and is very familiar with Linux (this is
a very small business, a family thing) insists that at no time did he
get prompted to enter a password for it.
So, here is postgres, having some (it appears) random? password, but I
can't change the password, because it hangs/crashes every time, no
matter the method.
But it sounds like people are saying that that's not a problem, really,
because it's all right to log into Postgres from root and that does not
(contrary to my random newbie ideas) make me root.. And anyway, if it
really concerned me, I could just log in to PostgreSQL as Postgres and
create a new superuser (one with createuser privs), and use the new
superuser in place of Postgres, if I wished.
Also, one person has suggested I delete and re-create Postgres, which I
will be trying in a little bit.
Cheers,
Laurel Williams
