Before you begin
- If you want to use the command-line examples in this guide:
- Install or update to the latest version of the gcloud command-line tool.
- Set a default region and zone.
- Create a Windows instance.
Generating a password
You can generate Windows passwords using either the
Google Cloud Console or the gcloud
command-line tool. Alternatively, you can
generate passwords programmatically
with API commands. If you forget your password, you can also use this procedure
to reset it.
Console
In the Cloud Console:
- Go to the VM instances page.
- Click the Windows instance where you want to generate a new password.
- On the instance details page, click the Set Windows password button.
- The username field specifies which Windows user receives the new generated password. If you want to create a new user, specify a new username in this field and Compute Engine will add that user with a new password.
- Click Set.
gcloud
Using the gcloud
command-line tool, run the reset-windows-password
command to
generate a username and password:
gcloud compute reset-windows-password windows-instance
Resetting and retrieving password for example-user on windows-instance Updated [https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/example-user/zones/us-central1-f/instances/windows-instance]. ip_address: 130.211.133.229 password: F0Lpj?5{*g.>5xT username: [USERNAME]
By default, the gcloud
tool generates a new password for the user
who authenticated to gcloud
. You can generate a password for another user
by including the --user
flag in the command. If the username does not
exist, Compute Engine generates a new username and password for
the instance with that username.
Changing a password
Compute Engine generates a random password, but you should change the password to a custom password that is meaningful to you. To set a custom password:
- Connect to your Windows instance using the generated password.
- After the desktop finishes loading, click the Start menu icon.
- Click Control Panel.
- Under the User Accounts icon, click either Change Account Type or Add or remove user accounts.
- Select the account that you want to modify.
- Click Change the password.
- Enter in your current password and your new password.
- Click Change password to save your changes.
- Test that your new password works by disconnecting and reconnecting to the instance using your new password.