Grossd won't start if statefile is enabled

[Mark Alan]

Binary package hint: gross

# while using Ubuntu 10.10 and Gross 1.0.2-2:

1. Using a working grossd
2. add line: statefile = /var/lib/gross/grossd.state to /etc/grossd.conf
grep '^[^# ]' /etc/default/gross /etc/grossd.conf
  /etc/default/gross:DAEMON_OPTS=""
  /etc/grossd.conf:protocol = sjsms
  /etc/grossd.conf:protocol = postfix
  /etc/grossd.conf:statefile = /var/lib/gross/grossd.state
  /etc/grossd.conf:check = dnsbl
  /etc/grossd.conf:dnsbl = bl.spamcop.net;2
  /etc/grossd.conf:dnsbl = combined.njabl.org
  /etc/grossd.conf:dnsbl = cbl.abuseat.org
  /etc/grossd.conf:dnsbl = dnsbl.sorbs.net

3. sudo -i -u gross "/usr/sbin/grossd -C"
  will silently end but no /var/lib/gross/grossd.state will be created

4. sudo /etc/init.d/gross restart
 * Restarting gross policy server gross [ OK ]
tail /var/log/syslog
  (...)grossd version 1.0.2 starting...
  (...)creating pidfile /var/run/gross/gross.pid
  (...)Grossd shutdown with exit code 2: stat(): statefile opening failed No such file or directory

5. sudo /etc/init.d/gross status
 * gross is not running

6. sudo ls -la /var/run/gross/gross.pid /var/lib/gross
-rw-r--r-- 1 gross gross 4 2011-02-05 11:48 /var/run/gross/gross.pid
/var/lib/gross:
total 8
drwx------ 2 gross gross 4096 2011-02-05 11:35 .
drwxr-xr-x 71 root root 4096 2011-02-05 10:26 ..

7. (cd /var/lib/gross/;sudo touch grossd.state; sudo chown gross.gross grossd.state) ; sudo /etc/init.d/gross restart ; sudo tail /var/log/syslog
  Grossd shutdown with exit code 2: statefile size differs from the calculated size

[Mark Alan (malan)]

[SOLVED] please close ticket.

The Ubuntu Gross .deb package postinst uses 'install -d -o gross -g gross -m 0700 /var/lib/gross' to create the /var/lib/gross directory in which the statefile should be stored.

In Ubuntu (at least with with apparmor on and using strict permissions enforcement), one must assure that sudoers & apparmor are configured to permit 'sudo -u gross /usr/sbin/grossd -C' to use the /var/lib/gross directory.