Red Hat Bugzilla – Bug 205330
Dovecot logs uses only UTC time
Last modified: 2010-10-22 01:56:48 EDT
Description of problem: Dovecot uses UTC time to log login details if 'login_chroot' is turned on. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): All How reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Set logins to work in a chroot gaol - in /etc/dovecot.conf: login_chroot = yes Actual results: Dovecot logging will use UTC time, ignoring /etc/localtime Expected results: Dovecot logging should respect /etc/localtime Additional info: This is caused because /etc/localtime is not accessible from the chroot gaol. Previous workaround is to disable the login_chroot feature. The following patch to the init.d script overcomes the problem: *** /etc/init.d/dovecot.logfix 2006-09-06 12:14:34.000000000 +1000 --- /etc/init.d/dovecot 2006-02-08 10:57:35.000000000 +1100 *************** *** 21,36 **** RETVAL=$? [ $RETVAL -eq 0 ] && touch /var/lock/subsys/dovecot - - # Check to see if login is chrooted - CHROOT_VAL=`grep ^login_chroot /etc/dovecot.conf | cut -f2 -d= | sed -e 's/^ *//'` - if [ "$CHROOT_VAL" != "no" ]; then - CHROOT_DIR=`grep ^login_dir /etc/dovecot.conf | cut -f2 -d= | sed -e 's/^ *//'` - if [ -z "$CHROOT_DIR" ]; then - # dovecot default - CHROOT_DIR="/var/run/dovecot/login" - fi - mkdir $CHROOT_DIR/etc - cp /etc/localtime /$CHROOT_DIR/etc/ - fi echo } --- 21,24 ----
I don't think the initscript is the right place to prepare chrooted environment. Better should be to add a standalone script (e.g. prepare-chroot.sh) into /usr/share/doc/dovecot-*/ that the user configuring chrooted login can call.
Although I agree in principle, the problem is that an admin wants to be able to configure Dovecot and be able to start the service using '/sbin/service dovecot start' (i.e. the useability of Dovecot should be the primary concern, not ideological correctness). This cannot happen the way you suggest because the description of the login_dir variable states (from /etc/dovecot.conf), # Directory where authentication process places authentication UNIX sockets # which login needs to be able to connect to. The sockets are created when # running as root, so you don't have to worry about permissions. Note that # everything in this directory is deleted when Dovecot is started. The localtime file is deleted each time Dovecot starts, so the only possible place to set this up in the chroot environment is in the initscript, after the daemon has been started. Ugly, but...
Hmm, after looking at the issue more seriously, the update to the init script looks like the right way.
This request was evaluated by Red Hat Product Management for inclusion, but this component is not scheduled to be updated in the current Red Hat Enterprise Linux release. If you would like this request to be reviewed for the next minor release, ask your support representative to set the next rhel-x.y flag to "?".
I'm sorry for not addressing the issue in RHEL-4. As dovecot is not scheduled for update in RHEL-4.9, I'm closing that bugzilla WONTFIX. If you are still experiencing the issue with RHEL-5, feel free to reopen it against RHEL-5.