[Mailman-Users] confusing permission errors, help please

[Mark Sapiro]

Hugh Esco wrote:

>I might need to do several instances of mailman before the new year, sailed right through my first install, but got stuck on the second one.  I'm seeking advice on how to build this.  Apparently I will need a distinct instance for each virtual host of the $prefix heirarchy.  I'm wondering though if I can have only a single copy of the installation directory which is created from unpacking the tar ball.   


I'm not sure what you're saying. Yes, you can unpack the tarball only
once into one source directory, but then for each mailman instance
you'll have to run configure in that directory with completely
separate --prefix (and --exec-prefix and --with-var-prefix if used)
values followed by "make install: for that instance.


>Also, I'm creating a unique vhost specific user for each instance of mailman.  Is this overkill?  Can a single mailman user support multiple vhosts?  


Yes. One mailman instance can support multiple vhosts. The restriction
is that since a single mailman instance has only one 'namespace' for
listnames, you can't have the same list name on two different vhosts
supported by the same mailman instance.

See
<http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/faqw-mm.py?req=show&file=faq04.047.htp>


>At any rate, to the error at hand:  
>
>At:  http://mumble.example.ca/mailman/listinfo
>Browser reports error as:  
>Forbidden
>
>You don't have permission to access /mailman/listinfo on this server.
>
>Additionally, a 403 Forbidden error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.
>
>/var/log/apache/mumble-error.log says:  
>[Mon Dec 19 22:43:27 2005] [error] [client nn.nnn.nn.nnn] (13)Permission denied: access to /mailman/listinfo denied
>
>permissions on directory and file are:  
>
>drwxrwsr-x   2 mumble mumble  320 Dec 19 18:38 cgi-bin
>-rwxr-sr-x  1 mumble mumble 36637 Dec 19 18:38 cgi-bin/listinfo
>
>apache configuration (which works based on function of other aliases) includes: 
>   ScriptAlias /mailman/ /u/m/mumble/mailman/cgi-bin/
>
>OK.  I'm stumped.  


Have you run /u/m/mumble/mailman/bin/check_perms?


>I would think that perhaps adding the apache user to the mumble group might do it, but /etc/group shows that the instance of mailman I put up two days ago (another virtual host on the same gentoo server), which works, did not require that intervention.  And I see that the permissions are 02755 on the script, so apache ought to be able to execute the script regardless.  
>


I agree.

Do you perhaps have something in your Apache config that directly or
indirectly removed the ExecCGI option from the
/u/m/mumble/mailman/cgi-bin/ directory?

-- 
Mark Sapiro <msapiro at value.net>       The highway is for gamblers,
San Francisco Bay Area, California    better use your sense - B. Dylan