Bug#635857: tinyproxy: fails to start. "tinyproxy: Could not open file /var/log/tinyproxy.log: Permission denied."

[Jason A. Spiro]

Package: tinyproxy
Version: 1.8.2-1squeeze1
Severity: grave
Justification: renders package unusable
X-Debbugs-CC: e...@debian.org;sfr...@snowman.net

Hi. Thank you for maintaining tinyproxy in Debian.

tinyproxy 1.6.3-2 from Debian 5 "lenny" worked fine. I just upgraded
to Debian 6 "squeeze" and the new tinyproxy 1.8.2-1squeeze1. Now
tinyproxy fails to start with a series of error messages including
"tinyproxy: Could not open file /var/log/tinyproxy.log: Permission
denied". Downgrading to 1.6.3-2 makes the problem go away.

I wonder if this could be a regression of the ancient bug
http://bugs.debian.org/159614 ("drops perms before opening log file").
That's a bug which was handled by ed, sfrost, and upstream. Do you
have copies of ancient tinyproxy 1.5.1-1 and tinyproxy 1.5.1-2 (from
2002) that you could post online or email me please? Maybe that will
help me try to see if this is the case.

Here's a transcript showing the problem.

[spiro@amd ~]% sudo /etc/init.d/tinyproxy start
Restarting tinyproxy: tinyproxy.

[spiro@amd ~]% ps | grep tinyproxy

[spiro@amd ~]% echo $?
1

[spiro@amd /tmp]% sudo /usr/sbin/tinyproxy -d &
[1] 6474

[spiro@amd /tmp]% tinyproxy: Could not open file
/var/log/tinyproxy.log: Permission denied
tinyproxy: Could not create file /var/run/tinyproxy.pid: Permission denied
/usr/sbin/tinyproxy: Could not create PID file.

[1] + exit 71 sudo /usr/sbin/tinyproxy -d

--
Jason Spiro: software/web developer, packager, trainer, IT consultant.
I support Linux, UNIX, Windows, and more. Contact me to discuss your needs.
+1 (416) 992-3445 / www.jspiro.com

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[Mike Gabriel]

Control: close -1

Hi,

On Tue, 3 Jan 2012 09:37:09 +0100 Jordi Mallach <jo...@debian.org> wrote:
> severity 635857 normal
> thanks

>
> On Fri, Jul 29, 2011 at 02:16:41AM -0400, Jason A. Spiro wrote:
> > tinyproxy 1.6.3-2 from Debian 5 "lenny" worked fine. I just upgraded
> > to Debian 6 "squeeze" and the new tinyproxy 1.8.2-1squeeze1. Now
> > tinyproxy fails to start with a series of error messages including
> > "tinyproxy: Could not open file /var/log/tinyproxy.log: Permission
> > denied". Downgrading to 1.6.3-2 makes the problem go away.
>

> When you upgraded from 1.6.x, you must have got a dpkg conffile upgrade
> prompt, and you probably refused to merge your configuration changes to
> the new configuration proposal.
>
> This left you with a configuration referencing /var/run/tinyproxy.pid and
> /var/log/tinyproxy.log for PidFile and LogFile. This, mixed to tinyproxy
> now dropping privileges much earlier in the startup sequence (a good
> thing), caused your problem.
>
> Compare your /etc/tinyproxy/tinyproxy.conf with
> /etc/tinyproxy/tinyproxy.conf.dpkg-new to see this and other differences.
>

The above obviously was a misconfigure system issue after upgrade.
Merging of conffiles is a basic must when upgrading.

Thus, closing.

Mike