[ale] howto force "give root password" prompt

[Chris Fowler]

fsck was unable to repair the filesystem automatically.


]On Thu, 2009-12-10 at 11:46 -0600, John G. Heim wrote:
> I have a problem with a vmware virtual machine. It's running debian/lenny. 
> After a power failure, it tends to not boot. It ssits at a prompt saying, 
> "Give root password for maintenance (or type control-D for normal startup."
> 
> I need to be able to get past this prompt if I'm not in the physical 
> presence  of the machine. I can log into the vmware server and hard boot it. 
> But it comes up the same way. There is a vmware command for answering 
> console questions. But I don't know if it will work. Other than pulling the 
> plug, how can I test it? I want to somehow make it come up with that prompt 
> to see if the vmware answer command will let me get past it.
> 
> 
> So this is not really a vmware question. It's just a linux question. What 
> causes a linux machine to come up asking if you want to enter maintenance 
> mode and can I artificially reproduce those conditions?
> 
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