Changing Passwords of SAP Standard Operating System Users

Many SAP systems make use of standard operating system users that, on the operating system level, have comprehensive access rights to database resources.

Special Operating System Users and Groups for SAP MaxDB (Unix and Linux)
Name	System Default Value	Type	Authorizations
`<sdb_user>`	`sdb`	User	Owner of all database resources
`<sdba_group>`	`sdba`	Group	Creating databases Analysis and error handling
Support group	`sdb<database_name>`	Group	Optional; support tasks
`root`	`root`	User	Installing the database software Granting access rights to operating system users (by their group affiliation) A SetUID root program is only required for a user change to `<sdb_user>`.
`<os_user>`	-	User	Normal operating system user Accessing the DBM server (requires a valid DBM operator name and a password to log on to the database instance) Accessing other database tools (for example Loader, SQLCLI), interfaces (ODBC, JDBC, SQLDBC) and all database tools that use these interfaces (for example Database Analyzer); a database user name and password are required Starting the X Server (SAP MaxDB communication server)
`<sid>adm`	-	User	SAP system administrator and database administrator in SAP systems Group member of `<sdba_group>`
`sqd<sid>`	-	User	Obsolete Not for SAP liveCache databases Owner of all database resources

Procedure

To keep unauthorized persons from learning the passwords of standard operating system users, we recommend the following measures:

Do not adopt the default passwords.
Use secure passwords.
Change the passwords regularly.

Changing the Passwords of Operating System Users (Unix and Linux)

Log on to the operating system as <sid>adm user.
Open a shell.
Enter the following command:
passwd
Enter the old and new passwords.

Repeat the procedure for the sqd<sid> user.

If you use the Network Information Service (NIS), you can read how to change the passwords of operating system users in the NIS Guide.

Changing the Passwords of Operating System Users (Microsoft Windows)

Log on to the operating system as a user from the Administrators group.
Change the password of the operating system user <SID>ADM.