wonders of linux

Recently, I was wrapping up my day at Bear Mountain. By day I go snowboarding and by night I poked and prodded around with computers, the internet, and whatnot. Well, one of the days I was there my friend contacts me in a panic begging me to come fix his computer. I of course tell him that I’m in Big Bear at the moment and not sure what I can do to help. At that I can practically see his heart sink, so I ask him what the problem is.

He starts into this story about how he has a paper due the next day but he can’t get logged into his computer. Apparently his roommate dropped something on the keyboard and the number row doesn’t work anymore, which limits him from logging into his machine (alphanumeric passwords are good ideas, ladies and gentlemen!). He’s using Fedora on his home machine, by my suggestion, so I know I can save the day.

As he continues this story I use ssh to connect to his machine…

ssh user@remote-host

..and open /etc/gdm/gdm.conf

I change two lines from:

AutomaticLoginEnable=false
AutomaticLogin=

to

AutomaticLoginEnable=true
AutomaticLogin=username

I save the file and restart gdm (Gnome Desktop Manager).

sudo /etc/init.d/gdm restart

By this time, he’s finishing his story about how he needs to get his paper written or he’s going to fail, never graduate and end up being homeless, etc.

I interrupt him to tell him to look at his computer, which is now logged in as his user, never requiring a password or username.

The phone goes silent. I ask if he’s still there. He is… he’s speechless.

I remind him this is all due to the wonders of Linux and wish him good luck with his paper.

Simple as that. SSH connection, two commands, a smart phone, and a very thankful friend all from a distance.