Jamf local User Password forgotten

S_Puschel
New Contributor III

Hello dear IT colleagues,
i have a problem. An employee has forgotten his local password, what can I do to reset it? Unfortunately there is only 1 account.

5 REPLIES 5

techjason
Contributor

I am hoping that this computer is in Jamf and connected to a network so it can talk to Jamf. If that is the case, the following command can be run through a Policy:

dscl . passwd /users/USERNAME "NEWPASSWORD"

USERNAME: The shortname for the account
NEWPASSORD: The password to give to the user

Thanks for this command, but it doesn't work because asks for old password of the user, also for me?

Thanks a lot

S_Puschel
New Contributor III

Hallo Techjason, Thanks for your solution, can you still tell me how to create the policy? Do I enter this under Script?

Thanks a lot for your solution.

techjason
Contributor

@S.Puschel This depends on your access to the machine.

If your connection is that you can run Jamf Remote to talk to the machine, I would create a shell script that will do this for you. Then you can push the script the machine with Jamf Remote.

If you do not have a direct connection to the machine, you will need to run it as a policy and wait for the computer to check-in. This can be done in two ways. If this is just a quick and dirty one time job, I would recommend #2.

  1. You can create a script with the command in it. And then add that script to the policy.
  2. You can just add it to the Execute Command Box under Files and Processes in the policy.

Then just set the policy to run on Recurring Check-in so that it runs the next time the computer checks in.

AdamCraig
Contributor III

Do you have Filevault turned on? because if so the answer is much more complicated and you'll need to use the recovery key to unlock the computer.
Also is the computer bound to AD?