If your /etc/shadow looks like

username:ssccccccccccc:....

Then the "ss" stands for the 2 character salt, and the "ccccccccccc" is your
encrypted password - just as the theory goes.

But the beloved, old, Unix password system is too easy to break nowadays.
So now they use something with md5() and longer passwords, and your
entry ought to look more or less like:

username:$1$xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx:....

where $1$ is not your salt, but just an indication of this new system. The x's do
use some kind of salt, but I'm not quite aware how it works.

Anyways - this is much, much more secure.

By the way, the 2 systems may coexist on the same computer, and you may get
one or the other depending on how you create your user, or change the password.