Script dscl . -passwd change for local account with Kace SMA?
I've attempted many different variations of running a local administrator account password change on our Macs with Kace... such as...
sudo dscl . -passwd /Users/localadmin -o oldPassword -p newPassword
sudo security set-keychain-password -o oldPassword -p newPassword /users/localadmin/Library/Keychains/login.keychain
or... just blowing away the keychain...
sudo dscl . -passwd /Users/localadmin -o oldPassword -p newPassword
sudo rm -r /Users/localadmin/Library/Keychains/*
and because we have many different passwords for the local admin account... a line for each...
sudo dscl . -passwd /Users/localadmin -o oldPassword -p newPassword
sudo dscl . -passwd /Users/localadmin -o oldPassword1 -p newPassword
sudo dscl . -passwd /Users/localadmin -o oldPassword2 -p newPassword
sudo dscl . -passwd /Users/localadmin -o oldPassword3 -p newPassword
sudo rm -r /Users/localadmin/Library/Keychains/*
But after running the script with Kace, I cannot su to the localadmin with "newPassword"... Or "oldPassword". So the Kscript seems to be changing the password, just not to what I am putting in the script.
I first thought it was a case of not properly escaping special characters (&^%$#!*_+) so I changed the password on a test machine to just be text and numbers. This did not help, and after running the script, I was unable to su into the localadmin account with either old or new password. The error was that I was using an incorrect password. Could this be due to character set differences? I've worn out my Google foo on this subject.
Answers (1)
Top Answer
Hello,
I have an Online Shell Script and this command works perfectly for me:
/usr/bin/dscl . -passwd /Users/USERNAME password
Special characters don't affect the script also works with 10.14.
Give it a try, It should work.
Comments:
-
Thanks Horacior! I wasn't hopeful because I could have sworn I tried that... But lo and behold! It worked! - kpm8 5 years ago
-
Actually, it appears to be touch and go. Looks like it works with High Sierra, but not Mojave. Also, and more importantly, the characters do matter. I learned I had to escape the '#' that was used in a password. Also, if I used a # sign in the beginning of the password, the new user admin password was set to blank. So, be very cautious with your password special characters! - kpm8 5 years ago
