Before you change your password check out the following websites for
criteria to use in selecting a good password:
http://www.alw.nih.gov/Security/Docs/passwd.html.
http://www.geri.duke.edu/csl/pword-msg.html
A good password is one that is difficult for a cracker to figure out
but easy for you to remember. Never write your password down anywhere,
and do not let such programs as your email client remember it.
Changing your password is quite easy. Use the F-Secure ssh program to
log on to the host 'geri.duke.edu'. Once you are logged on enter the
command 'passwd' (note the spelling). You will be prompted for your
current password, ie. the one you just used to get logged on. You will
then be prompted twice for your new password. Here is what a successful
password change looks like for a (non-existent) user called 'test':
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test@rubin> passwd
passwd: Changing password for test
Enter login(NIS) password:
New password:
Re-enter new password:
NIS passwd/attributes changed on garcia
test@rubin>
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Note that when you type in your password you will see nothing on your
screen. This is a standard security measure.
