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The Computer Science Department recommends that you change your password often, at least once a quarter. You should become familiar with the procedure described in this section. The following guidelines should be followed when selecting a password. The new password must be at least six characters long and should contain a random number. Avoid joes (i.e. any variation of your own name) and any other easy to guess words. WARNING: if you do not use a secure password (i.e. we in the CS Department are able to crack it) you may lose your machine privileges. Security of our systems depends on your password, and we are very security conscious. To change your password, issue the following command:
passwd
The system responds by prompting you for your current password to verify that you are authorized to make such a change. Then it asks you for the new password. On most systems, your password will be checked to make sure it is not easy to guess, if it is, it will ask you for a better password. After you enter the new password, it prompts you for it again. If the two inputs are identical, your password is changed. If they differ (if you made a typing mistake, for example) your password is not changed. This prevents you from mis-typing a password that you then could not use.
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