15

I try to setup postfix with smtp authentication. I want to use /etc/shadow as my realm

Unfortunately I get a "generic error" when i try to authenticate

# nc localhost 25
220 mail.foo ESMTP Postfix
AUTH PLAIN _base_64_encoded_user_name_and_password_
535 5.7.8 Error: authentication failed: generic failure

In the mail.warn logfile i get the following entry

Oct  8 10:43:40 mail postfix/smtpd[1060]: warning: SASL authentication failure: cannot connect to saslauthd server: No such file or directory
Oct  8 10:43:40 mail postfix/smtpd[1060]: warning: SASL authentication failure: Password verification failed
Oct  8 10:43:40 mail postfix/smtpd[1060]: warning: _ip_: SASL PLAIN authentication failed: generic failure

However the sasl setup seems to be fine

$ testsaslauthd -u _user_ -p _pass_
0: OK "Success."

i added smtpd_sasl_auth_enable = yes to the main.cf

This is my smtpd.conf

$ cat /etc/postfix/sasl/smtpd.conf 
pwcheck_method: saslauthd
mech_list: PLAIN LOGIN
saslauthd_path: /var/run/saslauthd/mux
autotransition:true

I tried this conf with the last two commands and without.

I'm running debian stable.

How can postfix find and connect to the saslauthd server?

Edit:

I'm not sure whether postfix runs in a chroot The master.cf looks like this: http://pastebin.com/Fz38TcUP

saslauth is located in the sbin

$ which saslauthd
/usr/sbin/saslauthd

The EHLO has this response

EHLO _server_name_
250-_server_name_
250-PIPELINING
250-SIZE 10240000
250-VRFY
250-ETRN
250-STARTTLS
250-AUTH LOGIN PLAIN
250-ENHANCEDSTATUSCODES
250-8BITMIME
250 DSN
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6
  • Are you running Postfix in chroot?
    – quanta
    Oct 8, 2011 at 11:20
  • Postfix is Running in a chroot.
    – Franz Bettag
    Oct 8, 2011 at 11:33
  • So where is your saslauthd located? What does the EHLO show?
    – mailq
    Oct 8, 2011 at 12:29
  • # which saslauthd /usr/sbin/saslauthd my master.cf looks like this: pastebin.com/Fz38TcUP
    – user97262
    Oct 12, 2011 at 12:47
  • 1
    is /var/run/saslauthd/mux made available in the chroot somehow? If not, there might be your problem.
    – rackandboneman
    May 19, 2012 at 22:23

1 Answer 1

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9

Are you perhaps missing the symlink from /var/run/saslauthd to /var/spool/postfix/var/run/saslauthd?

From my working system:

root@mail:/etc/postfix/sasl# ls -la /var/run/saslauthd
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 36 Dec 31  2010 /var/run/saslauthd -> /var/spool/postfix/var/run/saslauthd
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10
  • is it normal for an update followed by a restart to remove the symlink? this happens from time to time on ubuntu 16.04
    – Gaia
    Jun 24, 2017 at 20:36
  • 1
    I'm out of ideas, sorry. :-(
    – Paul Gear
    Aug 30, 2017 at 23:41
  • 1
    This blog from 2005 sorted out my similar issue: jimmy.co.at/weblog/2005/12/05/postfix-and-sasl-debian
    – David Tinker
    Jun 21, 2019 at 16:24
  • 1
    @MiSHuTka Postfix runs in a chroot jail in /var/spool/postfix, but saslauthd doesn't. So the saslauthd running outside the jail needs to point at the path where postfix expects the saslauthd files to be.
    – Paul Gear
    Feb 4, 2022 at 6:59
  • 1
    @MiSHuTka Note also that nowadays saslauthd is automatically configured to point at the correct place, without the need for a symlink. See OPTIONS="-c -m /var/spool/postfix/var/run/saslauthd" in /etc/default/saslauthd.
    – Paul Gear
    Feb 4, 2022 at 7:00

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