Recovery of deleted /etc/passwd File in Linux
In that case you need to recover /etc/passwd file first. For this you have to following steps, -Start GRUB on boot (press ESC while booting) -Press e over (recovery mode) -Press e over the line beginning with kernel -Press Space bar and enter "init=/bin/bash" -Press enter -Press b -At command prompt type: "cp /etc/passwd- /etc/passwd" -reboot to GRUB again -Press e over (recovery mode) -Press e over the line beginning with kernel -Press Space bar and enter "init=/bin/bash" -Press enter -Press b -At command prompt type "mount -o remount,rw /" -Type "passwd YOURUSERNAMEHERE" (IF you don't know your user name type "ls /home" (that is a Lower case L and lower case S) for a list of users) -Enter new password at prompt -reboot to normal boot. Hope that helps others like it did me! ### Then to recover /etc/shadow file, Use following command pwconf This command will generate /etc/shadow file from /etc/passwd Enjoy Linux!!