[NTLUG:Discuss] HELP! Upgrade went bad! My email server is DOWN!!!!!!

[Bobby Wrenn]

Stephen Davidson wrote:
> <RANT>
> I HATE IT when things that should "Just work" don't!  I have already 
> spent just under two days (about 10hrs so far) working on this, and I 
> can't afford the downtime anymore!
> 
> I was trying to upgrade my server from SuSE 8.1 to SuSE 9.2, as well as 
> configure a backup server so that my webserver would have a backup.  
> After a Motherboard Failure on the backup server was fixed by the fine 
> folks over at Alter, the OS install went smoothly.  KDE, networking, 
> etc, was installed.  SSH is up and running.  Mailman and Sendmail, that 
> is when things got F-----D up.  The server was running a couple of 
> mailing lists, including for the DFW J2EE SIG.  But Sendmail and Mailman 
> won't play nice, and this Java Dude does not have enough Linux in him to 
> fix this.  I have about 2 days before mail servers start dumping my 
> incoming email.  (This was sent using alternate accounts).  I am 
> desparate!  My client can't email me right now, and it is all cause some 
> config settings were changed, and NOT DOCUMENTED!!!! I have found, and 
> fixed some of the stuff, but I am still down and out!
> </rant>
> 
> This WAS working fine in SuSE 8.1.  I was not expecting a step backwards 
> during upgrade.
> 
> <Details>
> sendmail-8.13.1-5
> mailman-2.1.5-5
> OS: SuSE 9.2
> 
> blue:~ # newaliases -v
> /etc/aliases: 40 aliases, longest 10 bytes, 465 bytes total
> hash map "Alias1": unsafe map file /etc/aliases.d/mailman.db: Permission 
> denied
> WARNING: cannot open alias database /etc/aliases.d/mailman
> Cannot create database for alias file /etc/aliases.d/mailman
> blue:~ # ls -l /etc/aliases.d
> total 6
> drwxr-xr-x   2 root root 1024 Dec  6 06:49 .
> drwxr-xr-x  68 root root 5120 Dec  6 20:47 ..
> lrwxrwxrwx   1 root root   29 Dec  6 06:49 mailman -> 
> /var/lib/mailman/data/aliases
> lrwxrwxrwx   1 root root   32 Dec  6 06:49 mailman.db -> 
> /var/lib/mailman/data/aliases.db
> blue:~ # grep -i dontblame /etc/sendmail.cf
> #O 
> DontBlameSendmail=GroupWritableDirPathSafe,AssumeSafeChown,TrustStickyBit,GroupReadableSASLDBFile,GroupWritableAliasFile,WriteMapToSymLink 
> 
> O 
> DontBlameSendmail=GroupWritableDirPathSafe,AssumeSafeChown,TrustStickyBit,GroupReadableSASLDBFile,GroupWritableAliasFile,WriteMapToSymLink 
> 
> blue:~ #
> </details>
> 
> I checked the file permissions from a partial backup I made of the 8.1 
> system before the upgrade (I have the old /var/lib/mailman directory 
> handy).  The file permissions are the same!
> 
> SO WTH changed between 8.1 & 9.2 that the settings and permissions are 
> no longer functional?????
> 
> This has my systems email completely down, so please either respond to 
> my alternate address above, or feel free to call me at the number in my 
> SIG. I am VERY DESPERATE!
> 
> -Steve
> 
If you don't install Mailman often it is easy to miss some of this 
stuff. Most of the answers are out there but if you don't know the 
question to ask it can be very frustrating. I just finised a similar 
upgrade with Mailman and Postfix. I'm betting most of the things that I 
found will help you.

1. run /usr/lib/mailman/bin/check_perms
2. edit /usr/lib/mailman/Mailman/mm_cfg.py (note case) verify or change 
the DEFAULT_EMAIL_HOST setting (may also be DEFAULT_HOST_NAME)
3. verify /etc/mailman.cgi-gid matches the gid of your web server.
4. verify the preferd host name for this list on the general options 
page near the bottom.

Your file locations may vary. This is the default for SuSE 9.0

HTH
Bobby