Basically, if you run passwd and receive the error,”passwd: Authentication token manipulation error”, and passwd: password unchanged . error may be in likewise open and libnss-ldap. Unfortunately, even having this installed — but not configured — will prevent you from using passwd to update a local users’s password. Fortunately, the fix is very easy if you don’t actually use Likewise Open – just remove it from your system with this command:

sudo apt-get remove likewise-open

sudo apt-get remove libnss-ldap

Confirm the prompts and after apt-get is done, you should be able to use passwd like normal. Thanks to Bug 302026 for guiding me to the solution. and refer http://www.ideaexcursion.com/2009/09/11/fixing-authentication-token-manipulation-error-when-changing-passwords-with-passwd/ this u get an solution.

sp_addlinkedserver
@server = N’LnkSrv_RemoteServer_TEST’,
@srvproduct=N”, — Leave it blank when its not ‘SQL Server’
@provider=N’SQLNCLI’, — see notes
@datasrc=N’RemoteServerName’,
@provstr=N’UID=sa;PWD=sa;’
–,@catalog = N’MYDATABASE’ eg: pubs
GO

/*
Note:
To check provider name use the folling query in the destination server
Select Provider From sys.servers
*/
———————————————————————————————————-
– Optional
–EXEC sp_addlinkedsrvlogin ‘LnkSrv_RemoteServer_TEST’, ‘true’ — (self is true) — for LocalSeverLoginName
–GO

– Remote login
sp_addlinkedsrvlogin
@rmtsrvname = ‘LnkSrv_RemoteServer_TEST’,
@useself = ‘False’,
@rmtuser = ‘sa’,
@rmtpassword = ‘sa’
GO

– OR
/*
IF the above add linked server login failed then try in the Linked Server (LnkSrv_RemoteServer_TEST) Property
Select -> Security – > ‘For a login not defined in the list above, Connection will:’

Choose – > Be made using this security context
SET Remote login: sa
With password: sa
*/
———————————————————————————————————-

– Test server connection
declare @srvr nvarchar(128), @retval int;
set @srvr = ‘LnkSrv_RemoteServer_TEST’;
begin try
exec @retval = sys.sp_testlinkedserver @srvr;
end try
begin catch
set @retval = sign(@@error);
end catch;
if @retval 0
raiserror(‘Unable to connect to server. This operation will be tried later!’, 16, 2 );

– OR

BEGIN TRY
EXEC sp_testlinkedserver N’LnkSrv_RemoteServer_TEST’;
END TRY
BEGIN CATCH
PRINT ‘Linked Server not available’;
RETURN;
END CATCH
———————————————————————————————————-

– Get access linked server database
SET xact_abort ON
GO

BEGIN TRANSACTION
SELECT * FROM LnkSrv_RemoteServer_TEST.DBName.dbo.tblName
COMMIT TRAN
GO

– OR
SELECT * FROM OPENQUERY(LnkSrv_RemoteServer_TEST, ‘SELECT * FROM DBName.dbo.tblName’)
GO

– OR
SELECT * FROM OPENQUERY(LnkSrv_RemoteServer_TEST, ‘SELECT * FROM sys.databases Order by name’)
GO
———————————————————————————————————-

OLE DB provider “MSDASQL” for linked server “MYSQL” returned message “[MySQL][ODBC 5.1 Driver]Optional feature not supported”.
Msg 7391, Level 16, State 2, Procedure msg_insert, Line 17
The operation could not be performed because OLE DB provider “MSDASQL” for linked server “MYSQL” was unable to begin a distributed transaction.

it helped me to change the root password when I got the error

trying to change the root password