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#1 Tue, 08/02/2011 - 10:36
mr.veiss

PROFTPD

Hello I have a fresh instalation, of Ubuntu 10.04.1 on a virtual machine installed Virtualmin, with no other issues, except the proftpd was stopped, and not starting

when i tried to start it via virtualmin

I get this :

Failed to start FTP server :

  • Starting ftp server proftpd Illegal instruction

...fail!

no changes were made in config file it is defaut configuration, and log is empty.

PS I am new, to linux normaly i would reinstall whole server, but i have migrated some websites there, via ssh. ftp is needed for some website services

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 10:49
andreychek

Howdy,

Hmm, that's an unusual error!

Do you know what kind of Virtual Machine you're using?

Also, what is the output of this command (which you can run by logging into your server as root over SSH):

free -m

Also, what output do you receive if you try running the proftpd command manually:

proftpd -n

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 10:58
mr.veiss

It is a www.intovps.com provided service forgot to mention that ubuntu is 64bit i do not think it has anything to do with provider, otherwise it would affect other services

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 11:00
mr.veiss

proftpd -n --> Illegal instruction

free -m outputs total used free shared buffers cached Mem: 4096 1371 2724 0 0 0 -/+ buffers/cache: 1371 2724 Swap: 0 0 0

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 11:08
andreychek

We see a lot of strange issues occur on OpenVZ based VPS's... the way it handles memory management can lead to things not working as expected.

That may or may not be the case here :-)

It doesn't usually manifest itself as one command not working such as what you're seeing, it tends to be a bit more random.

If you run the command "cat /proc/user_beancounters", what output do you receive?

-Eric

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 11:32
mr.veiss

I have never expierienced problems like this on fresh install, this is first time

cat /proc/user_beancounters outputs

Version: 2.5
       uid  resource                     held              maxheld              barrier                limit              failcnt
    75002:  kmemsize                 25591138             36543510             54525952             54525952                    0
            lockedpages                     0                  949                 1024                 1024                    0
            privvmpages                355396               495226              1048576              1048576                    0
            shmpages                    13045                15710               102400               102400                    0
            dummy                           0                    0                    0                    0                    0
            numproc                        89                  640                  640                  640                    7
            physpages                  227750               324234                    0  9223372036854775807                    0
            vmguarpages                     0                    0               524288  9223372036854775807                    0
            oomguarpages               227755               324239               104857  9223372036854775807                    0
            numtcpsock                     21                   87                 1024                 1024                    0
            numflock                        8                   14                 2048                 2048                    0
            numpty                          1                    4                   64                   64                    0
            numsiginfo                      0                   33                 1024                 1024                    0
            tcpsndbuf                  308928              2293664              5368709             10737418                    0
            tcprcvbuf                  322464              4162592              5368709             10737418                    0
            othersockbuf               238944              1434800              5368709             10737418                    0
            dgramrcvbuf                     0                21880              1342177              2684354                    0
            numothersock                  154                  178                 1024                 1024                    0
            dcachesize                      0                    0              8053063             12582912                    0
            numfile                      3382                 6283                32768                32768                    0
            dummy                           0                    0                    0                    0                    0
            dummy                           0                    0                    0                    0                    0
            dummy                           0                    0                    0                    0                    0
            numiptent                      60                   60                 1536                 1536                    0
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 11:41
andreychek

Howdy,

Yeah, I've never experienced errors such as that on a default install either, except on OpenVZ installs :-)

That user_beancountesr file a list of memory parameters on OpenVZ-based systems.

It looks like the "numproc" has a "failcnt" of 7 -- that means that your provider is limiting the number of processes you can run at once, and on 7 different occasions, a process attempted to start, and was rejected due to the constaints.

Out of curiosity, if you run "proftpd -n" again, does that "failcnt" column for "numproc" go up to 8?

-Eric

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 14:29
mr.veiss

Eric No the failcount stays the same...

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 14:36
andreychek

Well, that's good, though it's unclear why you're getting that error.

Something strange is going on :-)

You said you checked the logs -- I just wanted to verify that /var/log/proftpd/proftpd.log was one of the logfiles you had looked at.

Also, what output do you get if you run this command:

dmesg | tail -15

That should show if there's any recent kernel errors.

Also, could you attach your /etc/proftpd/proftpd.conf file? I can try using your config on one of my test systems, and see if I'm able to provoke that error.

-Eric

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 14:43
mr.veiss

/var/log/proftpd is an empty directory dmesg | tail -15 has no output at the moment atached my proftpd.conf file, it is the default config that came with virtualmin - have some fun (just change extension)

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 14:48
andreychek

Howdy,

Well, Virtualmin doesn't provide the ProFTPd package, that's pulled down from apt... so there's room for something to go awry if something were unusual about the repository, or during the package installation.

Now, all that is all really unlikely, but you're also the first person to post here about this particular problem, so we're already within the "unlikely" realm of things :-)

I'll test that config and see if any issues stand out.

-Eric

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 15:05
andreychek

Okay, as you predicted, I'm not seeing anything unusual with your config file. When I place it on my test Ubuntu system, ProFTPd starts up just fine.

I'm running out of ideas as to what to suggest... there's nothing unusual about ProFTPd on a Virtualmin system, it's simply pulled down from the Ubuntu apt repository during Virtualmin installation. No additional configuration is done to that.

So, we should be dealing with an Ubuntu default.

When a default such as that doesn't work, it starts to point to the unusual... corrupt packages, disk errors, memory problems... and other yucky things :-)

Perhaps we ought to verify the package that you have... can you run this command:

dpkg -l 'proftpd*'

That should show what version of ProFTPd you have, as well as where it came from.

Also, the tool "debsums" can help in determining if something somehow became corrupt. You can install that by running this command:

apt-get install debsums

Then, try running it like this:

debsums -ca

When you run that, what output do you get?

-Eric

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 15:11
mr.veiss

Hmm what can go wrong, if the only comands and configs during instalation was

1) after set up i loged in as root 2) apt-get install wget mc htop 3) wget http://software.virtualmin.com/gpl/scripts/install.sh 4) sh install.sh 5) after the instalation scp -rp remoteuser@server.com/dir /localdir got backups from remote server 6) extracted backups (virtual minbackups) 7) stoped dovecot, clam, postgres, spam so no configuration or anything else to mess up, didnt had a chance yet... :D

dpkg -l 'proftpd*' gives us this outpot

Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold | Status=Not/Inst/Cfg-files/Unpacked/Failed-cfg/Half-inst/trig-aWait/Trig-pend |/ Err?=(none)/Reinst-required (Status,Err: uppercase=bad) ||/ Name Version Description +++-==============-==============-============================================ un proftpd (no description available) un proftpd-abi-1. (no description available) ii proftpd-basic 1.3.2c-1ubuntu Versatile, virtual-hosting FTP daemon - bina un proftpd-doc (no description available) un proftpd-mod-ld (no description available) un proftpd-mod-my (no description available) un proftpd-mod-od (no description available) un proftpd-mod-pg (no description available) un proftpd-mod-sq (no description available)

and output of debsums

root@vh11:~# apt-get install debsums Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done The following NEW packages will be installed: debsums 0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 2 not upgraded. Need to get 48.2kB of archives. After this operation, 274kB of additional disk space will be used. Get:1 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ lucid/universe debsums 2.0.48 [48.2kB] Fetched 48.2kB in 0s (506kB/s) debconf: unable to initialize frontend: Dialog debconf: (No usable dialog-like program is installed, so the dialog based frontend cannot be used. at /usr/share/perl5/Debconf/FrontEnd/Dialog.pm line 75, <> line 1.) debconf: falling back to frontend: Readline Preconfiguring packages ... Selecting previously deselected package debsums. (Reading database ... 65176 files and directories currently installed.) Unpacking debsums (from .../debsums_2.0.48_all.deb) ... Setting up debsums (2.0.48) ... debconf: unable to initialize frontend: Dialog debconf: (No usable dialog-like program is installed, so the dialog based frontend cannot be used. at /usr/share/perl5/Debconf/FrontEnd/Dialog.pm line 75.) debconf: falling back to frontend: Readline

root@vh11:~# debsums -ca /etc/apache2/suexec/www-data /etc/default/apache2 /etc/apache2/apache2.conf /etc/apache2/ports.conf /usr/share/bind9/bind9-default.md5sum /etc/bind/named.conf.local debsums: no md5sums for binutils debsums: missing file /etc/init/console-setup.conf (from console-setup package) /etc/init/networking.conf /etc/apache2/mods-available/php5.conf /etc/logrotate.conf debsums: missing file /etc/init/module-init-tools.conf (from module-init-tools package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/mountall-net.conf (from mountall package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/mountall-shell.conf (from mountall package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/mountall.conf (from mountall package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/mounted-varrun.conf (from mountall package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/mounted-dev.conf (from mountall package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/mounted-tmp.conf (from mountall package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/mountall-reboot.conf (from mountall package) /etc/mysql/my.cnf debsums: no md5sums for netbase /etc/init/ssh.conf debsums: no md5sums for php5 debsums: missing file /etc/init/plymouth-log.conf (from plymouth package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/plymouth.conf (from plymouth package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/plymouth-stop.conf (from plymouth package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/plymouth-splash.conf (from plymouth package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/procps.conf (from procps package) /etc/default/saslauthd debsums: missing file /etc/init/udev.conf (from udev package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/udevtrigger.conf (from udev package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/udevmonitor.conf (from udev package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/udev-finish.conf (from udev package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/tty3.conf (from upstart package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/tty2.conf (from upstart package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/tty6.conf (from upstart package) /etc/init/rc.conf debsums: missing file /etc/init/tty1.conf (from upstart package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/upstart-udev-bridge.conf (from upstart package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/tty4.conf (from upstart package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/tty5.conf (from upstart package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/control-alt-delete.conf (from upstart package) debsums: no md5sums for usermin debsums: no md5sums for usermin-virtual-server-theme debsums: missing file /etc/init/hwclock.conf (from util-linux package) debsums: missing file /etc/init/hwclock-save.conf (from util-linux package) debsums: no md5sums for webmin debsums: no md5sums for webmin-security-updates debsums: no md5sums for webmin-virtual-server debsums: no md5sums for webmin-virtual-server-theme debsums: no md5sums for webmin-virtualmin-awstats debsums: no md5sums for webmin-virtualmin-dav debsums: no md5sums for webmin-virtualmin-htpasswd debsums: no md5sums for webmin-virtualmin-mailman debsums: no md5sums for webmin-virtualmin-svn

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 15:26
andreychek

Hmm what can go wrong, if the only comands and configs during instalation was ... no configuration or anything else to mess up, didnt had a chance yet... :D

I completely understand, and I don't think you did anything wrong :-)

I don't see anything suspicious in your debsums output.

So, I'm fresh out of ideas as to what we can look at on your system.

I think the next step is to talk to your provider, tell them you receive an "Illegal instruction" error anytime you attempt to start your default ProFTPd install, and ask them if they're seeing any memory disk, or other errors related to your installation.

I suppose another alternative is that some security system could be running on your setup that's causing problems... things like SELinux, grsecurity, and the like are capable of causing that.

It shouldn't be a problem on a default Ubuntu installation -- but it's difficult to know what all a provider setup with their distribution images. You may want to ask if they're aware of any security settings that could cause that.

-Eric

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 17:26
Locutus

Since you're using Ubuntu 10.04 x64, just like me: Do you also get an error for proftpd -v? If not, what version is installed? You can check that in aptitude too.

What output do you get for:

which proftpd
cat \`which proftpd\` | md5sum
Tue, 08/02/2011 - 17:31
mr.veiss

I get output = dc86cf09005b764e32ea6191e6ed6d0f

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 17:33
mr.veiss

Got reply from vps support, and they are sugesting to reinstall, and likley I am doing so.

Tue, 08/02/2011 - 17:33
mr.veiss

ProFTPD Version 1.3.2c

Wed, 08/03/2011 - 03:52
Locutus

Okay, I have the same version and am getting a different checksum. So it's possible the binary (or maybe further files too) are corrupted... Maybe try reinstalling only the ProFTPD package first?

What's your output for uname -a ?

Mine is: Linux lyra 2.6.32-33-server #71-Ubuntu SMP Wed Jul 20 17:42:25 UTC 2011 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Wed, 08/03/2011 - 07:24
mr.veiss

Ok, as i got advice from vps support to reinstall, and they also could not find anything wrong. I did the rinstall multiple times :( last night, just to check

And run in to more intresting issues....

1) did the clean install of Ubuntu 10.04 x64, apt update then upgrade, clean virtualmin install via script, same problem apeared.

2) did the second reinstall with just same OS , just apt update and no upgrade, clean virtualmin install via script - same problem

3) took Ubuntu 10.04 x32 same scenario

4) Debian 6 x64 - install script ran for an frustrating 1 hour, i just reinstalled server to x32

5) Debian 6 x32 - Everything went fine, everyting works :)

by the way, before taking ubuntu, I tried Debian 5 which works perfect, but it did not fit with the subversion version, It has subversion 1.5.5 or something like that i had to have 1.6.6 or higher.

So thanks all of you, your help is apriciated, hope this discussion will solve some this problem to other people.

Wed, 08/03/2011 - 11:35
Locutus

Actually, seeing what kind of problems your hoster has with their installation images, I personally would either manually install an Ubuntu if that's possible, or more likely switch to a different hoster.

Having such issues with ProFTPD on a fresh install, I don't really want to know how many things will go wrong over the course of your hosting endeavors, when it comes to more complex things. :)

I'm not too fond in general of this OpenVZ stuff, considering users here report different and odd problems with that like once or twice per week.

Fri, 11/04/2011 - 14:51
lvsys

We're having the same issue. Proftpd is failing on Ubuntu 10.04 LTS 64 bit with XEN PV enabled.

Not sure why, but this is bad news especially since the XEN version of Ubuntu is now deployed by Citrix XEN server.

How can we get a new "good" build of proftpd?

Thanks

Fri, 11/04/2011 - 16:20 (Reply to #22)
andreychek

Well, there's nothing wrong with the default ProFTPd package that comes with Ubuntu 10.04 -- those packages are provided by Ubuntu, and should work fine out of the box. There's quite a few folks using that right now.

We've only seen problems when dealing with non-default packages, or systems with too little memory,

In the thread above, the checksum for the proftpd binary was different from a default installation.

You may want to try obtaining the ProFTPd package from a different mirror, and installing it in place of what you have now.

-Eric

Fri, 11/04/2011 - 16:29
lvsys

Hm. There was plenty of memory on the server.... To install Ubuntu 10.04.3 LTS 64 bit on Citrix Xen server 6, we are forced to pull the XEN-ready web installer from archive.ubuntu.com ---- so not only it's slow and frustrating, I bet you it's got plenty of non standard packages.

At this moment, we reverted our latest server to a classic Ubuntu 10.04 LTS 64 bit - non para virtualized (so non XEN-ready). And the virtualmin works without a glitch. No issues whatsoever with FTP.

I am out of time today, but I will be trying it again on monday with a fresh install from the XEN repos and the same virtualmin license that we just installed. If all goes well, we will be using that one instead.

I'll keep you posted.

Mon, 11/07/2011 - 18:11
lvsys

Still fails. We gave the machine 4 GB of RAM. Proftpd is still failing with "Illegal instruction"

We've been posting the issue with Citrix http://forums.citrix.com/thread.jspa?messageID=1594245&#1594245

because it looks like a Xen Server issue more so than a virtualmin issue.

Eric, how can we get another proftpd package installed on the box?

Thanks

Mon, 11/07/2011 - 22:05
andreychek

Well, you're using the ProFTPd package provided by Ubuntu. If you'd like a different package, you'd need to do one of the following:

  1. Compile ProFTPd from source, and use that

  2. Find an alternate provider for the ProFTPd package

  3. Create your own ProFTPd package from a newer Ubuntu version

I don't really have a recommendation there, as each of those comes with drawbacks... the ideal thing to try would be #3, but that can be a lot of work if you aren't familiar with building .deb packages.

Using #2 is simple, but I don't know of an alternate provider of a ProFTPd package for Ubuntu.

Which leaves #1 -- compiling it all yourself. That can be a bit of work as well, though may be your only option if the other two choices don't work out.

-Eric

Mon, 11/07/2011 - 23:09
lvsys

Yeah, I figured out as much. If you follow that other thread I posted on Citrix's website you will notice that I just compiled proftpd myself and it works.

But I don't like it: it makes disaster recovery a non-standard process. Bad practice.

This kind of stuff is supposed to work out of the box. the other question it's raising is: what other plain vanilla packages will start failing?

My preference also goes to #3. I actually started the learning process, but it looks like a giant mess to make a debian package.

===========================================

For future reference, here's how we recompiled proftpd:

1) dependencies:

apt-get install make gcc libssl-dev libmysqlclient-dev postgresql-server-dev-8.4 libsqlite3-dev libiodbc2-dev libldap2-dev libwrap0-dev

2) download the latest tarball, extract and get configure command line by typing "proftpd -V" with the older version (if you have it available before)

./configure '--prefix=/usr' '--with-includes=/usr/include/postgresql:/usr/include/mysql' '--mandir=/usr/share/man' '--sysconfdir=/etc/proftpd' '--localstatedir=/var/run' '--libexecdir=/usr/lib/proftpd' '--enable-sendfile' '--enable-facl' '--enable-dso' '--enable-autoshadow' '--enable-ctrls' '--with-modules=mod_readme' '--enable-ipv6' '--enable-nls' '--build' 'x86_64-linux-gnu' '--with-shared=mod_unique_id:mod_site_misc:mod_load:mod_ban:mod_quotatab:mod_sql:mod_sql_mysql:mod_sql_postgres:mod_sql_sqlite:mod_sql_odbc:mod_dynmasq:mod_quotatab_sql:mod_ldap:mod_quotatab_ldap:mod_ratio:mod_tls:mod_rewrite:mod_radius:mod_wrap:mod_wrap2:mod_wrap2_file:mod_wrap2_sql:mod_quotatab_file:mod_quotatab_radius:mod_facl:mod_ctrls_admin:mod_ifsession' 'build_alias=x86_64-linux-gnu' 'CFLAGS=-O2 -D_LARGEFILE64_SOURCE -D_FILE_OFFSET_BITS=64 -DHAVE_OPENSSL -DUSE_LDAP_TLS ' 'LDFLAGS=-Wl,-Bsymbolic-functions' 'CPPFLAGS=' 'CXXFLAGS=-g -O2' 'FFLAGS=-g -O2'

3) compile and install

make && make install

Tue, 11/08/2011 - 07:39
andreychek

My preference also goes to #3. I actually started the learning process, but it looks like a giant mess to make a debian package.

Oh, don't start from scratch... I would suggest grabbing an existing Ubuntu source package for ProFTPd on a newer version of Ubuntu, and then attempting to compile it. The only things you might need to deal with are to tweak any dependencies if the compile fails.

But you may need to deal up a bit on installing and compiling .deb packages.

This kind of stuff is supposed to work out of the box

I completely agree! And it usually does. The fact that only two people have reported this problem, and it works great for other folks, is quite strange.

You may also want to take this to the Ubuntu community, and see if they have some thoughts. The problem has only been reported on Ubuntu systems, and it's a package provided by their "Universe" repository. It's possible that they might have some thoughts on what's causing this.

-Eric

Tue, 11/08/2011 - 13:57
lvsys

Thanks for your input. Yeah, I think I should take this up to the Ubuntu community.

What strikes me as strange is that it's only happening in PV mode (para virtualized) on the XEN server, but not when we're in HVM mode (simulated).

Not sure what the difference is. I just know that PV mode exposes more of the processor than HVM and this might be a processor incompatibility. If you look at the compilation options, it's compiled with O2 optimizations. That could be conflicting.

Thanks for the help. Compiling does fix the problem but still... I am worried about other packages failing...

MD

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