[vox-tech] mail problems with debian

[Peter Jay Salzman]

begin msimons@moria.simons-clan.com <msimons@moria.simons-clan.com> 
> On Sat, Nov 16, 2002 at 01:24:01PM -0800, Peter Jay Salzman wrote:
> >    p@satan% telnet belial.ucdavis.edu 25
> >    Trying 169.237.43.86...
> >    Connected to belial.ucdavis.edu.
> >    Escape character is '^]'.
> >    Connection closed by foreign host.
> >    p@satan%
> > 
> > so that's why mail stopped working.   next i looked at inetd.conf:
> > 
> >    smtp       stream tcp nowait    mail /usr/sbin/exim  exim -bs
> 
> this line is correct.
> 
>   if you replace the command to run with /bin/false you should see the
> same telnet behavior as you included above.
> 
> 
> > i'm no expert at inetd.conf, but this looks good to my untrained eyes.
> > next i looked at the log files:
> > 
> >    Nov 16 13:12:58 belial inetd[335]: execv /usr/sbin/exim: Permission denied
> >    Nov 16 13:13:04 belial inetd[341]: execv /usr/sbin/exim: Permission denied
> >    Nov 16 13:14:19 belial inetd[371]: execv /usr/sbin/exim: Permission denied
> 
>   it appears that inetd is unable to run /usr/sbin/exim.  the permission
> denied message is from execv inside inetd... if you change the inetd.conf line
> to run /etc/passwd you should get a similar problem.
> 
> Nov 16 13:51:40 salomon inetd[779]: execv /etc/motd: Permission denied
> 
> > apparently, exim is trying to do something it doesn't have permission to
> > do.  like bind to a port.   however:
> 
>   inetd is the service logging the error.
> 
> > belial# ll /usr/sbin/exim
> > -rwsr-xr-x    1 root     root       471144 Sep 20 10:34 /usr/sbin/exim*
> 
>   The permissions you show above are correct, but the size and timestamp
> I have locally doesn't match a stable woody exim.  Try doing things like

filesize 471144 and timestamp sept 20 should match a testing exim.  i
don't actually own a woody system anymore.   :)


> salomon:/etc# file /usr/sbin/exim
>   /usr/sbin/exim: setuid ELF 32-bit LSB executable, Intel 80386, version 1 (SYSV), dynamically linked (uses shared libs), stripped

check

> salomon:/etc# /usr/sbin/exim
>   exim: neither action flags nor mail addresses given

check

> salomon:/etc# debsums exim | grep -v OK$
> 
>   ... to make sure the binary there is actually executable.
 
empty.

 
> > i'm running out of ideas.  help?
> 
>   it's unlikely but if inetd is running in some sort of jail (which I don't
> thing debian inetd does out of the box) then it may be running a completely
> different exim binary from the one your ls shows.
> 
>   If exim checks out I would recommend starting with a strace on your 
> inetd process...
 
good idea.  i'll give that a try.  hope i have enough disk space.  ;)

pete

-- 
Fingerprint: B9F1 6CF3 47C4 7CD8 D33E 70A9 A3B9 1945 67EA 951D