Forums | MacLife

Well, to start, you would need all powerful access (there is an easy way to do this, but a smart admin would have disabled it).

Then, you would need to know at least Pico and how to navigate in UNIX, and then you would have to be able to read and decipher all of the contents of a plist file.

Other than that, you're hosed.

Note: I don't condone any of this stuff I'm about to say. Neither is totally legal, I'm pretty sure... messing with school computers, that is, not resetting passwords.

Basically, the only way you can do stuff with OSX is with an admin password. Since I assume you don't have and can't get it, you would have to reset it to one of your choosing. To do this, boot off a Jag install CD. Up in one of the menus, there is an option to reset password. Do it, and do whatever it says, and voila! You now have control over the computer through that password. Of course, the real admin will notice when their password no longer works...

Also, people at (B&M) stores are idiots. They have the display Macs more often than not logged in as admins. I love to go in there, create a new user for me, leave a little message in the password hint dialogue (along the lines of what they did wrong and how to fix it), and then delete/block their login user. They usually learn and just put a non-admin as the default after that, but Fry's actually wasted money on a security login app - for OS X! Like it needs help in the security department...

You can over-ride the booting from the CD, if you know how to turn it off.  The admin password thing will work, but you need one thing - the admin user name.  A real system admin wouldn't have be stupid enough to have it as "SystemAdmin" or leave root access open!

The best way is to boot in single user mode, but you have to know how to read plist files, you can view and edit them in PICO

Come into this dark  back-alley, and I will tell all....

Single User mode doesn't work because it's a read-only filesystem, which does you no good, even though you are God (root).

Booting off of a CD works, and real-life system admins are usually pretty stupid if they are working at a school, so they won't have done Open Firmware.

Last (legal) resort: If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.  Join up with the system admins, and they will appreciate the extra help.  Then, after having them trust you (after weeks of great help and honesty!), you may get some pretty powerful information.  DON'T TELL THIS TO ANYBODY.  Trust NOBODY  .  Next, you can make a user in NetInfo, and it won't be visible in the preference pane, and chances are, the admin won't notice.  Give it some random home location, etc.   Do this on the server, and any computer will have it.  Give it admin privs, and name it the name of some other student's login name modified a little bit  . There you go, you've just become God.

Last (illegal) resort:  Get a password cracker, and crack the root password.  I can't post that one on these boards tho   You can even use their machines for the tremendous processor ability you will need to crack it (unless the admins are REALLY stupid).

Did I just say all of that?

Daniel Staudigel