leafnode and the user "news"

xsteadfastx · Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2004 1:45 pm Post subject: leafnode and the user "news"

hi,

i try to use leafnode here in my home-network to fetch the news for the whole family. i already ran leafnode on my suse desktop box but now i wanted to switch on an older gentoo box which just is there for leafnode and as test webserver. leafnode seems to work cause

TNorthover · Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2004 2:02 pm Post subject:

The reason that's happening is because the shell for news is set to /bin/false in /etc/passwd, so it exits immediately. This *could* be fixed by changing that to /bin/bash.

The best way of fixing this (IMO) is to use sudo instead of su directly (for security reasons). To do this you'd add a line like this to /etc/sudoers:

xsteadfastx · Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2004 2:47 pm Post subject:

thanks alot...thats alot i needed to know

and how does it look like when i want to run it as cronjob? can i just uncomment the fetchnews file in /etc/cron.hour/ ?

a other question. i cant connect with slrn on the newsserver.....but when i use thunderbird from a other computer in the network it works...what do i wrong?

thanks so much for all your help

TNorthover · Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2004 3:23 pm Post subject:

I've just noticed a slight mistake in my above post (you probably would have spotted it when you tried, but just in case), it should be:

xsteadfastx · Posted: Mon Sep 27, 2004 3:45 pm Post subject:

i will try that tomorrow at work with the sudo command in the crontab. that sounds like it would work

i will tell you tomorrow what telnet says cause i first need to emerge telnet...
thank you so much for the help and i will try everything tomorrow

thanks alot

xsteadfastx · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 6:09 am Post subject:

hi.

so i testet that with the telnet and this is what happens...it doesnt look that good

TNorthover · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 8:14 am Post subject:

What that output indicates is that the port is open and has something listening on it, but that thing immediately closes the connection once it's opened. So nmap is doing what I'd expect for that output -- showing that something's listening on the port, it doesn't care that the program terminates immediately.

Anyway, I've managed reproduce the effects you see by fiddling with the only_from line in /etc/xinetd.conf. Mine says "only_from = localhost", I'd assume yours doesn't since you can access it from the LAN. It looks like it's a space separated list of hosts (if ip addresses 0 counts as wildcard). Could you make sure localhost (or 127.0.0.1 of course) is in that list, and spelled correctly? If it isn't, try restarting xinetd after correcting it and see if that works.

If that doesn't work, could you post the whole xinetd.conf file, in case there's anything else there?

xsteadfastx · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 9:00 am Post subject:

where i can find the list with the allowed hosts?
i looked into my /etc/xinet.conf and it lookes like this:

TNorthover · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 9:35 am Post subject:

I can't see anything particularly wrong there.

As an option, you could edit /etc/xinetd.d/leafnode-nntp and add the line "only_from = localhost" just above "socket_type = stream", and restart xinetd to register the changes. That may work, though I'm doubtful.

Could you try the telnet, then post the output of "tail /var/log/messages", see if that gives any hint over what's happening?

xsteadfastx · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 9:40 am Post subject:

after

TNorthover · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 10:17 am Post subject:

Firstly (except it's an edit):

xsteadfastx · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 11:54 am Post subject:

yes i did that with the spaces around the "=" and i still have the same problem.

for the 3 points

1. i checked all files in /etc/xinet.d/ and everything is "disable = yes" except leafnode-nntp

2. "no_access = " without anything behind the "="? i did that and restarted..nothing changed..

3. the same like with 2. i tried that and nothing changed

can it be that its cause leafnode has problems with my config?

TNorthover · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 12:22 pm Post subject:

It's definitely xinetd blocking access, that FAIL line you posted translates to it blocking access because of the address it was coming from, and if leafnode was getting started it would put some messages in /var/log/messages -- even if just to say it didn't like the config file.

Hmm, OK, let's see what xinetd thinks is going on. Could you do "killall xinetd", then "xinetd -d" to run it in debug mode. It'll give lots of output, then keep running in the foreground. Could you post the output it gives (there may well be some that scrolled off the screen)?

When it's just waiting you can Ctrl-C it and start xinetd daemon as normal again.

I'm sorry this is taking so long, I expect it'll turn out to be something trivial I've overlooked.

xsteadfastx · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 12:38 pm Post subject:

so i run xinetd -d and this comes out..the last messages come when i try to connect again with slrn..i hope that maybe shows where the problem is..thank you

TNorthover · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 2:02 pm Post subject:

I'm afraid I've only been able to dredge up one more simple suggestion: put "only_from = 0.0.0.0" in /etc/xinetd.d/leafnode-nntp. If this works, make sure you've got a firewall stopping any machine on the internet getting in, otherwise trouble could be caused.

After that, things get a little more complicated. First you could try "emerge xinetd", either with or without tcpd in the USE flags. I can't see this making much difference, but it could.

Then we get onto serious debugging, which is quite involved -- I'd suggest modifying xinetd to print more output. Basically, I'd post a patch here and instructions on compiling an xinetd with it in, and we'd see what that extra output gives (I think I'd post something to confirm absolutely that leafnode isn't involved first). I'm perfectly willing to proceed with this, but you may not be -- it involves trusting some random weirdo on the internet who you've never met not to be malicious.

xsteadfastx · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 4:09 pm Post subject:

hi,

ok i need to say im really sorry. i took the computer home and put it here in the internet and now its working. it looks like leafnode needed to have to fetch enws for one time till it works complete...i did that and now it works...i was just so curious about that..i mean i thought a telnet would work no matter what...ok but now its working and i thank you a million times for all the time and help...thanks so much

TNorthover · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 4:19 pm Post subject:

That is definitely strange. Oh well, as long as it's working; and I'm sorry I didn't spot that.

xsteadfastx · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 4:23 pm Post subject:

im the person who need to say sorry

so...
but one last question....i user syslog-ng and leafnode writes all the output into /var/log/messages....is there a better resolution?

TNorthover · Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2004 5:08 pm Post subject:

OK, that's a syslog-ng matter. I think (at least it works on mine...) that if you add these 3 lines to /etc/syslog-ng/syslog-ng.conf just above the two existing "log {..." lines, it should work:

xsteadfastx · Posted: Wed Sep 29, 2004 9:46 am Post subject:

for you it was from the beginning that syslogd-ng writes the output in /var/log/message? i just wonder

TNorthover · Posted: Wed Sep 29, 2004 4:41 pm Post subject:

I'm not quite sure what you mean. Is it that leafnode logs went to /var/log/messages on my computer as well? If so, then yes they did until I added those lines to syslog-ng.conf.

xsteadfastx · Posted: Wed Sep 29, 2004 7:47 pm Post subject:

yes thats what i meant

ok thank you..i will try that

thank you so much for all your help....i already love gentoo just cause the pretty good community