[set root's shell to /bin/tcsh before installing /bin/tcsh]

First off, that's not a super idea. NetBSD's not bad about it, but
a lot of vendor OS's ASSUME that root's shell is what they set to. So if
you change it, you can hose a lot of the system. Also, did you compile
tcsh as a staticly-linked binary? If not, if you loose the shared libraries,
root can't log in. Very evil.

My solution to this problem is to just add another root account. I call
it croot (for csh-based root on systems which ship w/ sh). That way
root has its default shell, and you always have a shell you're comfortable
with.

> I have tried booting into single user mode but the system comes up in read
> only and I can't vipw or cp the password file.  I also tried doing cpout
> from the mini-shell on the installer but the passwd file comes out and
> SimpleText won't open so I can manually change the shell back to something
> that works.
> 
> Any ideas would REALLY be appreciated.  I will also be accepting public
> humilitation (time and place to be announced).

This one's in the FAQ. You need to mount root rw in single-user mode.
Something like mount / should do it. It comes up ro so that you can
fsck the root partition safely.

Take care,

Bill