User password trouble - SOLVED -

[birger]

On Sat, 2010-07-17 at 12:32 -0400, Bob Goodwin wrote:
> 
>     The keyboard has failed!
> 
>     Typing the password characters after the root prompt shows one key
>     does nothing, not even a blank space!

:-D I got bitten by the same problem. Too bad I didn't see this thread
earlier.

I had changed my password, and suddenly I was unable to log in from any
system except the one I used while changing. Neither the old or the new
password worked on any other system.

I finally thought of checking the keyboard on the system I used when
changing the password, and it turned out one character I almost never
used (I mostly type email and shell programs on that system) didn't
work...

Turning it upside-down and shaking it was enough to clear up the
problem.

The password with a missing character was actually even more difficult
to crack, and quite easy to remember after that episode, so it was kept
for a long time :-)

birger