Managing user passwords and aging policies

This section covers commands that are used to manage passwords and password aging parameters in the shadow password file available in CentOS 7.

Setting a user password using the passwd command

The passwd command is used to either set the user's initial password or modify the user's existing password. The syntax of the passwd command is as follows:

$ passwd    <username>

The root user can set the password for any user to any value without knowing his current password. For a regular user, the default policy is to use at least an eight-character password, and it should not be a dictionary word, or the username, or a previous password. An example updating a user's...