Skip to content

vBlog.nl

All about technology

Menu
  • Home
  • VMware Cloud Director
  • vSphere
  • Automation
    • PowerCLI
    • PowerShell
    • Terraform
  • NSX
  • Horizon DaaS
  • About Us
Menu
vCloud Availability root account locked

Unlock or reset vCloud Availability root account

Posted on January 7, 2020

This article will explain the steps to unlock or reset the vCloud Availability root account. There are a couple of scenarios where you might need this.

For example when the account is locked out after too many fault attempts you will get “Access denied” when you login:

The vCloud Availability root account is locked out..

In my case I was just being stupid.. I forgot to update the new password in my SSH client after I had to reset the password during the first boot.
This caused my root account to be locked out.

During the initial deployment of the vCAv management appliance, you have to enter a root password as shown below:

vCloud Availability initial deployment
vCloud Availability initial deployment

After the deployment has finished, you can login by navigating to https://<FQDN>/ui/admin.

vCAv Management portal -  First login
vCAv Management portal – First login

Now you have to reset the password you entered minutes ago.
When you do, don’t forget to save it somewhere safe! 😉

Reset the password after first login
Reset the password after first login

Enough introduction..
Let’s get started with the steps required to unlock or reset vCloud Availability root account!

Table of Contents

  • Reset vCloud Availability root account
  • Unlock the vCAv root account

Reset vCloud Availability root account

vCloud Availability is build on PhotonOS. The first step we have to take is reboot the appliance and enter the GRUB menu by hitting ‘e’ during the boot.

Hit 'e' during the initial boot process to enter GRUB menu
Hit ‘e’ during the initial boot process to enter GRUB menu

In the GRUB menu, add “rw init =/bin/bash” to the line starting with Linux.. and hit F10

 Add "rw init =/bin/bash" to the line starting with Linux
Add “rw init =/bin/bash” to the line starting with Linux

The appliance will boot in the bash shell now.

 In the shell, type  “mount -o remount,rw /” and hit Enter
In the shell, type “mount -o remount,rw /” and hit Enter
In the shell, type “passwd root” and hit Enter
Enter the new password twice and hit enter
Enter the new password twice and hit enter
In the shell, type “umount /” and hit Enter
In the shell, type reboot -f to reboot the appliance

After you finished these steps, you can logon to the portal and SSH again with the new password.

Unlock the vCAv root account

If you only want to unlock the account without setting a new password, the steps are almost equal.

Replace the step where you type “passwd root” with “/sbin/pam_tally2 -r -u root” to unlock the account.

In the shell, type  “/sbin/pam_tally2 -r -u root” and hit Enter
In the shell, type “/sbin/pam_tally2 -r -u root” and hit Enter
In the shell, proceed with "umount /" and "reboot -f" commands
In the shell, proceed with “umount /” and “reboot -f” commands

After you finished these steps, you can logon to the portal and SSH again with the unlocked root password.

Logon to the vCloud Availability Admin portal
Logon to the vCloud Availability Admin portal
Successful logon to the vCloud Availability Admin portal
Successful logon to the vCloud Availability Admin portal

Other posts you might like:

  • Upgrade to vCloud Director 10 appliance
  • Deploy vCloud Director 9.7 with 3 cells
  • Setup a NFS share for vCloud Director with Windows Server 2019

Loading

Share on Social Media
x facebook linkedin reddit emailwhatsapptelegram

1 thought on “Unlock or reset vCloud Availability root account”

  1. David says:
    January 8, 2021 at 12:04 am

    Hi. Nice post!

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recent articles

  • Workspace ONE Access services monitoring July 11, 2023
  • vCloud Director API – Couldn’t connect to cloud server with the provided session id May 24, 2023
  • Horizon DaaS – Maximum sessions exceeded May 9, 2023
  • VMware Cloud on AWS with FSx for NetApp ONTAP December 28, 2022
  • Workspace ONE Access – Change certificate December 22, 2022
  • UI themes for VMware Cloud Director 10.4.1 and later December 16, 2022
  • VMware Tanzu Kubernetes Grid December 15, 2022
  • Workspace One Access – Not logged in to server FQDN. Please invoke Save before Sync December 12, 2022
  • NSX Edge configuration has failed. 1G hugepage support required. December 7, 2022
  • Horizon DaaS – Unable to connect to Desktop November 24, 2022

Tags

Automation bootstrapping Container Service Extension Credential Manager Desktone.log ESXi EUC EXi GPU Horizon DaaS Instant-Clone Logging NSX nsx-t PowerCLI PowerShell Putty Raspberry PI SSL Tanzu Terraform update vcd-cli vCenter vCloud vCloud Availability vCloud Director VDI vGPU VMware VMworld vSAN vSphere vVols workspace one Zerto

VMware Cloud Provider Blog

  • Ransomware Recovery for Cloud Providers Using VMware Cloud Director Availability
    by Nikolay Patrikov on September 28, 2023 at 10:30 am

    According to multiple reports, one of the biggest challenges for organizations is being targeted by Ransomware attacks. It is now happening more frequently than ever, which leads to several complications such as re-infection during recovery, prolonged recovery period, etc.  One of the most efficient ways to counteract this is to implement an effective Disaster Recovery policy. It … Continued The post Ransomware Recovery for Cloud Providers Using VMware Cloud Director Availability appeared first on VMware Cloud Provider Blog.

  • Tanzu Mission Control Self-Managed Now Available for Cloud Services Providers and Sovereign Cloud Providers
    by Christopher Wong on September 28, 2023 at 10:00 am

    Tanzu Mission Control, VMware’s centralized Kubernetes management platform, is evolving quickly from its initial release in 2020 to adapt to industry trends and changing customer needs. As observed in the VMware State of Kubernetes 2023 report, over 50% of respondents indicated they wanted to leverage multiple clouds to reduce vendor dependency, while 42% wanted to … Continued The post Tanzu Mission Control Self-Managed Now Available for Cloud Services Providers and Sovereign Cloud Providers appeared first on VMware Cloud Provider Blog.

  • End of NSX Migration for VMware Cloud Director…! What Should I Know?
    by Jaikishan Tayal on September 26, 2023 at 5:03 pm

    In May 2023, VMware unveiled the 7th major release of the VMware NSX Migration for VMware Cloud Director 1.4.2 tool, introducing an extensive array of functionalities and elevating the tool’s capabilities to encompass a comprehensive set of features, facilitating the migration of VMware Cloud Director Networking from NSX for vSphere to VMware NSX (formerly known … Continued The post End of NSX Migration for VMware Cloud Director…! What Should I Know? appeared first on VMware Cloud Provider Blog.

  • Alternative Solutions for Unsupported Features in VMware NSX Migration for VMware Cloud Director…!
    by Jaikishan Tayal on September 26, 2023 at 4:30 pm

    The VMware NSX Migration tool for VMware Cloud Director has seen multiple updates aimed at improving its capabilities and keeping pace with the evolving nature of both VMware Cloud Director and VMware NSX releases. However, it’s worth mentioning that there are certain features that remain unsupported. This could be attributed to their intricate nature or … Continued The post Alternative Solutions for Unsupported Features in VMware NSX Migration for VMware Cloud Director…! appeared first on VMware Cloud Provider Blog.

  • Understanding vGPU functionality with VMware Cloud Director
    by Jaikishan Tayal on September 26, 2023 at 2:02 pm

    VMware Cloud Director (VCD) is a cloud management platform that enables service providers to offer multi-tenant cloud services to their customers. When it comes to using Virtual Graphics Processing Units (vGPUs) with VCD, here are the key details and advantages: VMware Cloud Director (VCD) with vGPU support offers advantages not only for virtual machines (VMs) … Continued The post Understanding vGPU functionality with VMware Cloud Director appeared first on VMware Cloud Provider Blog.

©2023 vBlog.nl | Design: Newspaperly WordPress Theme