[plug] Password Composition

[Earnshaw, Mike]

List,

When I changed a users password to the one they selected I received a "BAD
PASSWORD: Too short" message, but it appeared to accept the password at the
second typing.

My question is can the "check" of whether a password is bad or not be
modified in some way? For example to force alternate upper/lower case and a
mixture of numerals and alpha.

I know it spits the dummy with common names etc. The man page on RH6 did not
reveal much in way of configuration options.

Also, but not related to this immediate question, I once tried to select a
root password with !@#$%^&*() characters within it. The system appeared to
accept it, but would not allow me to log in. When I later read the man page
for "passwd" a "!" is used to disable a password, so maybe that was my
error? but are the other characters valid for a password?

Thanks

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