After trying to change my password with usermod -p <new password> <username>
( which seemed to work but didn't give any messages ) I found I could not log in using either my old or new password. From what I've read it looks like maybe this is due to usermod expecting the password given to be encrypted?
How can I get back in?
Yes, this problem happened because usermod -p expected the password hash (i.e., the encrypted password), not the cleartext password.
From man 8 usermod:
-p, --password
PASSWORD
The encrypted password, as returned by
crypt.
Note: This option is not recommended because the password (or
encrypted password) will be visible by users listing the processes.
The password will be written in the local
/etc/passwdor/etc/shadow
file. This might differ from the password database configured in your
PAM configuration.
You should make sure the password respects the system's password
policy.
You can get back in the same way you would if you lost the administrator password under any other conditions.
If you have an administrator account, and it's not the account you specified as <username>, you can get it back by changing the password in the usual way:
sudo passwd <username>
