vsftpd 3.0.3-3ubuntu1 fails to start on installation

[Steve Langasek]

vsftpd 3.0.3-3ubuntu1 is stuck in xenial-proposed because it's failing its autopkgtests.

The reason for the autopkgtest failure is straightforward; vsftpd is failing to start on installation.

$ systemctl status vsftpd.service
● vsftpd.service - vsftpd FTP server
   Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/vsftpd.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
   Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Mon 2016-03-28 19:55:47 UTC; 7min ago
 Main PID: 25705 (code=exited, status=2)

Mar 28 19:55:47 xenial-i386 systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Mar 28 19:55:47 xenial-i386 systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Mar 28 19:55:47 xenial-i386 systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT
Mar 28 19:55:47 xenial-i386 systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Unit entered failed state.
Mar 28 19:55:47 xenial-i386 systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
$

Manually running the command from the service file fails with:

$ sudo /usr/sbin/vsftpd /etc/vsftpd.conf
500 OOPS: vsftpd: not configured for standalone, must be started from inetd
$

This is due to debian/patches/0013-listen.patch, which has caused the daemon to not listen on either ipv4 or ipv6, so it fails to start at all.

[Louis Bouchard (louis)]

I have been working on parallel on this one & opened a bug in debian : http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=819546

listen_ipv6 was reverted from YES to NO following Debian Bug: #803999 to allign with the manpage statement.

Either we revert it back & adapt the manpage or we force it in the systemd unit & document accordingly

[Arto Jääskeläinen (ajaaskel)]

I hope the init script will be fixed to give some error message when starting fails. Currently (I'm using v3.0.2) it fails without any description of actual problem when "listen=YES" in /etc/vsftp.conf is missing:

    sudo service vsftpd start
    vsftpd stop/pre-start, process 22319

That leaves user to wonder what's going on. No sign of error in any log, no error on terminal. The executable alone will start ok in terminal, giving idea to peek inside start script...

/etc/init/vsftpd.conf:
-------------------------
# vsftpd - FTP Daemon
#

description "vsftpd daemon"
author "Chuck Short <email address hidden>"

start on runlevel [2345] or net-device-up IFACE!=lo
stop on runlevel [!2345]
respawn

pre-start script
        check_standalone_mode()
        {
                # Return 1 if vsftpd.conf doesn't have listen yes or listen_ipv6=yes
                CONFFILE="/etc/vsftpd.conf"

                if [ -e "${CONFFILE}" ] && ! egrep -iq "^ *listen(_ipv6)? *= *yes" "${CONFFILE}"
                then
                        echo "${CONFFILE}: listen disabled - service will not start"
                        return 1
                fi
        }
        [ -d /var/run/vsftpd ] || install -m 755 -o root -g root -d /var/run/vsftpd
        [ -d /var/run/vsftpd/empty ] || install -m 755 -o root -g root -d /var/run/vsftpd/empty
        check_standalone_mode || stop
end script

exec /usr/sbin/vsftpd

[Christian Ehrhardt  (paelzer)]

Fixed in:
vsftpd (3.0.3-3ubuntu2) xenial; urgency=medium

  * Revert debian/patches/0013-listen.patch: In vsftpd.conf, set
    listen_ipv6=NO. This fix introduces a regression, FTBS and goes against the
    debian policy.

 -- Louis Bouchard <email address hidden> Wed, 13 Apr 2016 09:29:50 +0100

Quite a while actually, but the changelog missed the LP to auto-close.

[Atif Ali (atif6624)]

root@IT:~# journalctl -u vsftpd.service
-- Logs begin at Sat 2020-06-06 05:16:34 GMT, end at Thu 2020-06-18 06:18:35 GMT. --
Jun 17 12:04:49 IT systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 17 12:04:49 IT systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 17 12:04:53 IT systemd[1]: Stopping vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 17 12:04:53 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Succeeded.
Jun 17 12:04:53 IT systemd[1]: Stopped vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 17 12:04:53 IT systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 17 12:04:53 IT systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 17 12:11:44 IT systemd[1]: Stopping vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 17 12:11:44 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Succeeded.
Jun 17 12:11:44 IT systemd[1]: Stopped vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 17 12:11:44 IT systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 17 12:11:44 IT systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 17 12:11:44 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT
Jun 17 12:11:44 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
Jun 17 12:11:57 IT systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 17 12:11:57 IT systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 17 12:11:57 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT
Jun 17 12:11:57 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
Jun 17 12:19:06 IT systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 17 12:19:06 IT systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 17 12:19:06 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT
Jun 17 12:19:06 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
Jun 17 12:19:12 IT systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 17 12:19:12 IT systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 17 12:19:12 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT
Jun 17 12:19:12 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
-- Reboot --
Jun 18 04:11:50 IT systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 18 04:11:50 IT systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 18 04:11:50 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT
Jun 18 04:11:50 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
-- Reboot --
Jun 18 04:50:20 IT systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 18 04:50:20 IT systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 18 04:50:20 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT
Jun 18 04:50:20 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
Jun 18 06:14:54 IT systemd[1]: Starting vsftpd FTP server...
Jun 18 06:14:54 IT systemd[1]: Started vsftpd FTP server.
Jun 18 06:14:54 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=2/INVALIDARGUMENT
Jun 18 06:14:54 IT systemd[1]: vsftpd.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.