[Mailman-Users] FAQ 6.9 on Debian Sarge

[Todd Zullinger]

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Manlio Perillo wrote:
> I hit the problem described in the FAQ 6.9.
> 
> However I don't want to
> chmod 0666 data/aliases*

Yuck.  Nor would I.  That shouldn't even be in the FAQ, AFAIAC.

> A better solution, IMHO, is:
> chmod 0660 data/aliases.db
> chmod 0660 data/virtual-mailman.db
> adduser www-data list

Really, since you're using a Debian package, the proper permissions
and groups should be setup by the package.  If there isn't already a
Debian bug filed for this, it seems like there ought to be.  If I were
a Debian user, I'd file it.

The instructions in the FAQ deal mostly with installing Mailman from
source, using the default settings/user/groups/etc.  When a
distributor makes changes, like Debian does with the file locations
and user/group, they should also be the ones that get the bug reports
for problems their changes introduce.  Trying to cover all the myriad
ways that a distributor might break various features in Mailman in the
FAQ tends to make the FAQ more complicated than it needs to be.

I'm not picking on Debian or implying that they're wrong to change
things to fit better within their system, just noting that the problem
is something that should be fixed in the Debian packaging.  The same
is true for any other vendor that packages Mailman.

All that said, I *think* that you ought to be able to use the general
solution in the FAQ, but instead of using chown mailman:mailman, use
chown root:list (or whatever user and group Debian installs mailman
under.  There shouldn't be a need to chmod anything to 0666.  That's
an accident waiting to happen.

Would anyone object to my changing that FAQ entry to remove this
suggestion for 0666 permissions and making a note that the chown
command should use whatever user/group values are used by your
distribution for Mailman?

- -- 
Todd        OpenPGP -> KeyID: 0xD654075A | URL: www.pobox.com/~tmz/pgp
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If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything.
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