Save Your Device Passcodes!

My iPad Mini has a passcode set on it.  This is always a good idea, even if it doesn't leave the house very often.  You probably don't enter your password every time you read your email for instance.  A quick scan of the emails will show where you shop, where you bank, etc.  Follow that up with a quick 'forgot password' on the site and it's instant access if someone has your device.

So, passcodes are a good thing.  In my case, my iPad Mini also is connected to my work email system which not only requires a passcode but also requires changing it every 120 days.  That's not too bad; I have a system for my passcodes.  Except...

A few weeks ago my passcode expired at about 11 pm.  And I changed it to, something.  I know at the time it made sense and it would be easy to remember.  Unfortunately, it wasn't and several days later I realized I had absolutely no idea what it was.  And that is a problem.

You see, there (by design) is no way to recover a forgotten passcode.  Even if you can still unlock your iDevice with a fingerprint you can't change the passcode without entering the current one.  And eventually your device is going to require that passcode.  Even if you don't set it to force a passcode every 'x' days it will require it after a power up or upgrade.  You will be locked out.  And when you are locked out there is only one solution; wipe it and reload from a backup.

Luckily for me I could still unlock my iPad mini so I quickly hooked it up to my MacBook and did a backup (I normally back up only to iCloud).  Then, I powered off the Mini and turned it on holding the home button down.  This started it in recovery mode.  I attached it back to my MacBook and recovered from backup.  This reloads the data and most settings and steps you through the normal process for a new device (including setting a new passcode).  It will still have to download the actual apps.  The whole process took about an hour or so, but at least I didn't lose anything.

So the lessons are:

1) Back up your device regularly.

2) Put that passcode in your password manager because lots of weird things make sense in the middle of the night.