Trisquel is a distro derived from Ubuntu, modified to remove non-free software. As an Ubuntu derivative, the VPS guides for running Ubuntu and Debian should also be valid for Trisquel.

Reasons to run Trisquel:

• based on Ubuntu/Debian
• stable LTS releases
• active project since 2007
• endorsed by the Free Software Foundation

The default root login is root/root.

The first thing you should do is to change the password by running `passwd` on the command line.

root@trisquel:~# passwd

Enter new UNIX password: 
Retype new UNIX password:

However, you may encounter this error message:

passwd: Authentication token manipulation error
passwd: password unchanged

All you need to do is reboot.

root@trisquel:~# reboot

Then [c] - Connect to your console again from the VPS menu to the root account and try changing the password again for root.

After this, it is highly recommended to create a new user for normal activities and disable root login.

You should add a new user account for regular use. Replace <username> below with the username you want for the user account.

root@trisquel:~# useradd -m <username>
root@trisquel:~# passwd <username>
Enter new UNIX password: 
Retype new UNIX password: 
passwd: password updated successfully

The -m switch on useradd creates your home directory at /home/<username>. By default, this new user is also assigned to a new group with the same name as the user.

Presumably, you need sudo privileges for this newly created user, so you would add this user to the “sudo” group so that it can run commands as root.

usermod -aG sudo <username>

• Change the password of root user: passwd
• Disable root access: /etc/ssh/sshd_config
• Block unused ports: iptables
• Change default SSH port: /etc/ssh/sshd_config

How Trisquel Is Made | Trisquel GNU/Linux