passwords not recognized when su'ing from a terminal

[Karl Larsen]

Alain Cochard wrote:
> Andreas Bernauer writes:
>
>  > Alain Cochard wrote on Fri, Jul 20 2007 at 11:59 (+0200):
>
>  > > Just a few days ago, I stopped being able to 'su' or 'su
>  > > some_user' from a terminal: the passwords are no longer accepted.
>  > > Same problem to unlock a session (need to enter the password).
>
>  > You may not have noticed, but the problem seems to be that PAM is
>  > denying access.  Check the file /etc/pam.d/su to see why it may be
>  > doing this.  My su-file looks like the one attached and is from
>  > FC6.
>
> Thanks Andreas.  Unfortunately, my /etc/pam.d/su file is exactly
> identical to yours...
>
>  > You may also want to turn on some 'debug' option flag in the pam
>  > modules.  However, there is no general debug interface to PAM
>  > (unfortunately).
>
> Well, I read the pam and pam_authenticate manuals, but have no idea of
> how to start on that.  It appears to be way beyond my abilities.
>
> Any more clues, anyone?
>
> Alain
>
>   
    Think about what you were doing a few days ago. Did your computer 
turn off wrong? Where you doing anything that might have caused pam to 
loose data? I looked at my /var/log/secure and it is clean with just the 
bare essentials reported. You do have a problem.

Karl