You can reset your password following the next steps:
Reboot your computer / Turn your computer on.
Hold down the Shift key at the start of the boot process to enable the GNU GRUB boot menu (if it does not show)
Press ESC at the GNU GRUB prompt.
Press e for edit.
Use the Arrow keys to highlight the line that begins with kernel and press the e key.
Go to the very end of the line and add rw init=/bin/bash
Press Enter and then press b to boot your system.
Your system will boot up to a passwordless root shell.
Type in passwd yourusername
Set your new password.
Restart your system.
I tried:
In Linux Mint 12, the line to edit begins with “linux” and not “kernel”
Follow steps 1 through 4 above.
In step 5, navigate to the end of this line:
linux /boot/vmlinuz-3.0.0-12-generic root=UUID=[letters and numbers][letters and numbers] ro quiet splash vt.handoff=7
replace
ro quiet splash vt.handoff=7
with
rw init=/bin/bash
so it looks like this:
linux /boot/vmlinuz-3.0.0-12-generic root=UUID=[letters and numbers][letters and numbers] rw init=/bin/bash
Press Ctrl-x or F10 to boot with these options
Follow steps 8 through 11 in Alexio’s tutorial as normal
Thank you to Alexio and bugmenot. Extremely helpful. I am no guru, but if anyone does have results, this is what did:
1) start computer, press f10 to launch the boot screen. (I use multiple operating systems so there were many options)
2) Using the arrow keys, I moved to Linux mint (not Linux mint in recovery mode) and hit “e”.
3)again using the arrow keys, i moved down to the line beginning with linux/boot etc.. etc.. (as posted by bugmenot)
4)using the arrow keys I started replacing the command as directed. NOTE: THE RW HAD TO HAVE THREE SPACES AFTER IT BEFORE TYPING INIT=/BIN/BASH example: rw>>>init=/bin/bash NOT rw>init=/bin/bash (> being a space)
5) after replacing the command I used the arrow keys and moved up to the very top line then hit Ctrl+x. I dont know why but that is how it worked for me.
Reference
http://community.linuxmint.com/tutorial/view/339
Image credits pcmag.com
