RPM problem -- made even worse

[Alan]

>>
>> On Mon, 2008-02-25 at 14:46 -0800, Alan wrote:
>>> >
>>> > Have you tried yum-complete-transaction?
>>> > If not do this:
>>> >
>>> > yum install yum-utils
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > yum-complete-transaction
>>> >
>>> > it should clean up your aborted transactions.
>>>
>>> Oh crap did that screw things up.  It deleted about a dozen packages.
>>> Now
>>> whenever i try and log in I get "unable to authenticate" for EVERY user
>>> (including root) on the box.
>>
>> boot it up in single user mode and see if you can get in and/or booting
>> with init=/bin/sh
>
> I can get it to boot.  Now I need to figure out what it deleted.
>
> I may have to work on it tonight since I only have wireless access at
> work.
>
>> It should have removed those packages, if the transaction was where you
>> claim then those were just extras left hanging around.
>
> Since this has happened more than once, it may have gotten something else.
>
> install.log does not list what got deleted.  I will search for a yum log.
>
>> Then again there are lots of cases where simply finishing out the
>> removal portion of the transaction isn't enough.
>
> I guess so.

More info...

I found the yum.log.  (Named /var/log/yum.log.)  It listed that "pam" was
one of the packages erased.

I ran "rpm -V pam" to see what was missing.  Just every file used by pam. 
The database lists pam installed for i386 and x86_64.  I guess I get to
grab those packages and force a reinstall.

At least I know what is screwed up again.

I think that program needs some work...