Disable ESXi Password Complexity

A part of my job as a VMware Certified Instructor is to update our lab systems whenever new vSphere versions come out.

After upgrading from 5.5 to 6.0 I decided we should change passwords, however I was unable to choose the unsecure password I had decided to use:

Weak password: based on a dictionary word and not a passphrase.

Obviously, we need to mess with the password complexity requirements to resolve this.

Password complexity is managed by the /etc/pam.d/passwd file.

Here is the default content:

To temporarily disable password complexity requirements we can comment out the first and third lines and edit the second with command: vi /etc/pam.d/passwd

Remember you can type “i” to enter insert mode, press “ESC” button to stop, then type 😡 (and press Enter) to exit and save.

If you messed up and want to exit without saving type :q! (and press Enter).

A quick look at the file to see the end result:

Let us try changing password again:

Success!

Once the host comes back up I suggest you edit the /etc/pam.d/passwd file back to its original settings.

Please leave a comment if this was useful to you.