How to change password for encrypted USB key install?

[vancardboardbox]

Having spent some time customizing a USB install of Puppy 4.2.1 I now wish to share the goodness by giving clones of my key to a few friends and family.

The problem is that I chose light encryption and created a password for login when I installed and I do not want folks using this password. Can the password be changed? Can encryption and password protection be removed?

Thanks!

[fratermus]

The problem is that I chose light encryption and created a password for login when I installed and I do not want folks using this password. Can the password be changed? Can encryption and password protection be removed?

Dunno the answer but I am following along with interest.

There is/was a .pet that alters/adds/removes encryption but it was released in the Puppy 3.x timeframe. I tried to use it on my HD-installed 4.2.1 box and totally hosed my savefile.

* puppy wouldn't ignore the save file with pfix=ram, etc.
* puppy blew up trying to use the save file
therefore
* puppy would not run

I may have misused the tool, but it was so jacked that I had to use a non-Puppy OS to reformat the SSD so puppy couldn't see the hosed saved file and blow up trying to read it. After I reformatted the SSD I reinstalled 4.2.1 with the desired amount of encryption.

[vancardboardbox]

^I think you are referring to file encryption within the file system. I am referring to an option to encrypt and password protect the save file on a USB install. This is a user option that I only see referred to on the very first save of a USB Puppy - the user can specify heavy, light or no encryption. Selecting heavy or light requires setting a password.

I have been unable to find a means of changing this once it has been set up on the first save. Hoping someone out there knows how.

[fratermus]

^I think you are referring to file encryption within the file system. I am referring to an option to encrypt and password protect the save file on a USB install. This is a user option that I only see referred to on the very first save of a USB Puppy - the user can specify heavy, light or no encryption.

That's what I am talking about. There is a tool in this thread that will allow you to change light/heavy/none after making that initial choice. But it blew up in my face as described above.

resizes and/or changes the encryption mode and/or changes the file system of your pupsave, by generating a new one from your currently-booted pupsave. It leaves the old one untouched. With this tool, the following tasks can be accomplished:
1) Resize the pupsave larger or smaller (within reason). Size does not have to be a power of 2; if you want a 439MB pupsave, you can have it.
2) Change from using the default cleartext pupsave to an encrypted one.
3) Change from using an encrypted pupsave back to a cleartext one (perhaps for reason of maintenance), or change which encryption algorithm is used.
4) Change the password on your encrypted pupsave (by simply generating another encrypted pupsave with a different password).
5) Change from an ext3 to an ext2 pupsave, or vice versa.

There's the tool; you have been warned.

[PaulBx1]

I assume you are referring to my utility, convert-pupsave? This is the first complaint I've heard about it.

Hard to see how it could mess up an existing pupsave, since it only reads from it, creating a new pupsave at the end and leaving the old one alone. However it wouldn't hurt to be paranoid, and make a backup copy of your pupsave before you start. In fact that is a good habit to get into, when doing anything unusual, even just installing pets.

It sounds more like you had a file system problem. Puppy not being able to boot "pfix=ram" is a clue. I do warn people to use it only after a reboot.

It can be used to change passwords or eliminate encryption on the newly-created pupsave.

[fratermus]

Hard to see how it could mess up an existing pupsave, since it only reads from it, creating a new pupsave at the end and leaving the old one alone.
...
It sounds more like you had a file system problem. Puppy not being able to boot "pfix=ram" is a clue. I do warn people to use it only after a reboot.

{Edit: didn't mean it as a complaint; I appreciate your work and the work of the other developers. I pointed the OP to your utility but could not in good conscience omit the fact that it didn't end well for my OS. Seems to work fine for everybody else as far as I can tell.}


I don't know how it got cross-threaded. Like I said, I could have misused it or been sniffing glue or something. I don't have a way to know if the old or new pupsave was blown. But it was a completely vanilla and normal-acting box until I tried to encrypt a previously-unencrypted pupsave file. I concede that it could be coincidence.

After I rebooted it was absolutely resistant to booting into any mode of Puppy that I could find. Couldn't even use a fresh puppy BootUSB image to rescue the situation. Whatever was now on the SSD was luring in the puppy boot sequence like a tractor beam. I used some other LiveUSB distro to wipe the SSD and start fresh. Puppy happily booted off USB from that point on.

If the filessystem blew the frak up perhaps I gave the utility bad info, or it died while making the new pupsave fs and took the the SSD's filesystem down with it in some exotic way. Dunno.

[vancardboardbox]

Sorry for my confusion, fratermus. I checked out that thread and gave the utility a go. First attempt failed due to partition issues on the USB key. I had cloned this key from my original using dd but failed to note that I was copying a 8GB partition to a 4GB key! Issues, naturally.

Cloned again using a different technique, gave the utility another try and it worked swimmingly! No more encryption or password. Many thanks!

[Barkin]

I assume you are referring to my utility, convert-pupsave? This is the first complaint I've heard about it ... It can be used to change passwords or eliminate encryption on the newly-created pupsave.

I have a complaint, I just used your utility to create a new encrypted savefile with a new password. Everything seems fine except the new savefile has 25Mb less free space than the old one. The original and new savefiles were both the same size (512Mb), but the new one has 25Mb less free space, (both with heavy encryption, both ".2fs" type).

Is there a 25Mb temporary file made during the creation of the new savefile which I can now delete to get the free space back ?.

Or possibly 25Mb worth of duplicate files have accidentally been created ?

[ I'm still using Lupu-525, which may be relevant, on a USB memory stick ]