SAMUNLOCK(8)

📦 version 140201, in debian bookworm, debian trixie, ubuntu jammy, ubuntu noble, ubuntu questing, ubuntu resolute, ubuntu stonking

💅 SAMUNLOCK — the manual, bestie edition ✨

okay so this is samunlock(8), part of the System Manager's Manual, and it's genuinely one of the most useful little gremlins in the toolkit. buckle up 🎀

🌸 NAME 🌸

samunlock — unlock users in the SAM user database 🔓

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

samunlock [options] -uuser <samfile>

💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

This manual page documents briefly the samunlock command. Yes, briefly. It's a whole vibe, not a whole novel 📖

samunlock is a non-interactive command line utility that can unlock a user and/or the user's account bits from the SAM user database file of a Microsoft Windows system — and when we say Windows we mean Windows NT, 2000, XP, Vista, 7, 8.1, etc. etc. the whole family reunion 🪟✨

That file is usually located at \WINDOWS\system32\config\SAM on the file system of a Microsoft Windows Operating System. yes. that exact path. don't @ me 💅

On success, the program does not output any information and the exit code is 0. silent. mysterious. iconic. 🤫

👑 OPTIONS 👑

  • -h — show a summary of options. the classic "help me help you" move 🆘
  • -U — unlock the user. this is the main character option fr fr 🔓👑
  • -a — unlock all the users. if you use this one, there is no need to specify the next option. skip it, bestie, you don't need it 🫶
  • -u <user> — the user to unlock. the user value can be provided as a username, or as a RID number in hexadecimal (if the username is preceded with '0x'). Usernames including international characters will probably not work 😭
  • -l — lists the users in the SAM database. window shopping, but for accounts 🛍️
  • -H — output human readable output. by default the program prints a parsable table unless this option is used. so it's table mode vs. human mode, pick your fighter 📊➡️👀
  • -N — do not allocate more information, only allow the editing of existing values with same size. no growing, only same-size editing 🔒
  • -E — do not expand the hive file (safe mode). safety first, always 🦺
  • -t — print debug information of allocated blocks. nerd mode activated 🧠
  • -v — print verbose information and debug messages. extra chatty, extra loud 📢

🌈 EXAMPLES 🌈

samunlock -U -u theboss

Unlock an user named 'theboss', if found. (yes, theboss. the boss of you, specifically 💅)

samunlock -U -u 0x3ea

Unlock an user with RID '0x3a'. 👀

💀 KNOWN BUGS 💀

If the username includes international (non-ASCII) characters the program will not (usually) find it. use the RID number instead. it's not a bug, it's a ✨limitation✨ but like. it's a bug. use the RID 🫠

🦋 SEE ALSO 🦋

chntpwd, reged, samusrgrp

You will find more information available on how this program works, in the text files /usr/share/doc/chntpw/README.txt and /usr/share/doc/chntpw/MANUAL.txt 📚

More documentation is available at the non upstream's author site: https://github.com/rescatux/chntpw 🌐

🎀 AUTHOR 🎀

This program was written by Adrian Gibanel Lopez.

This manual page was written by Adrian Gibanel Lopez <adrian15sgd@gmail.com>, for the Debian GNU/Linux system (but may be used by others). giving credit where credit is due, always 🫶

okay and that's the whole page!! 🥳 written on the 6th December 2017, from the System Manager's Manual, and this is SAMUNLOCK(8) signing off. stay unlocked, bestie 💖🔓✨

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