[Pkg-mailman-hackers] Bug#371074: mailman: web interface gives internal server error

[Rob Ristroph]

Package: mailman
Version: 2.1.8-1
Severity: grave
Justification: renders package unusable


I installed mailman with apt-get.  It installed as a dependancy when
I was installing gforge.

It worked at least well enough to create some lists at some point.
Since then the system has been apt-get upgraded several times.

Now, when I go to any of the mailman links, such as listinfo or the
admin page of a list, I get this in my browser:

====================================
Internal Server Error

The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was
unable to complete your request.

Please contact the server administrator,
webmaster at gforge.mydomain.com and inform them of the time the error
occurred, and anything you might have done that may have caused the
error.

More information about this error may be available in the server error
log.
==================================

Among other background information you should know:

-- I had to "ln -s /usr/lib/cgi-bin/mailman /usr/lib/mailman/cgi-bin/"
before the gforge apache configs would find mailman properly

-- The output of check_perms:
=================================
 check_perms -f
 /var/lib/mailman/mail bad group (has: root, expected list) (fixing)
 /var/lib/mailman/cgi-bin bad group (has: root, expected list) (fixing)
 /var/lib/mailman/logs bad group (has: root, expected list) (fixing)
 /var/lib/mailman/Mailman bad group (has: root, expected list) (fixing)
 /var/lib/mailman/bin bad group (has: root, expected list) (fixing)
 /var/lib/mailman/icons bad group (has: root, expected list) (fixing)
 /var/lib/mailman/templates bad group (has: root, expected list)
 (fixing)
 /var/lib/mailman/locks bad group (has: root, expected list) (fixing)
 /var/lib/mailman/scripts bad group (has: root, expected list) (fixing)
 /var/lib/mailman/cron bad group (has: root, expected list) (fixing)
 Warning: Private archive directory is other-executable (o+x).
 This could allow other users on your system to read private
 archives.
 If you're on a shared multiuser system, you should
 consult the
 installation manual on how to fix this.
 Problems found: 10
 Re-run as list (or root) with -f flag
=================================

Also, instead of apache running as www-data on this system, it is
running as another user; however, it runs mailman as the user it expects
via the suexec directive, I have this in the apache conf file:

SuexecUserGroup www-data www-data

I see no messages in the logs when the error happens, except for this
in the gforge apache logs:

[Wed Jun 07 02:24:31 2006] [error] [client 70.112.100.20] Premature end
of script headers:
 admin, referer:
 http://gforge.mydomain.com/mail/admin/index.php?group_id=7

I can't find a core file or anything like that.

I should also mention I removed the mailman package at one point and
installed the current version of mailman from source, but with the same
results (I thought I was installing it wrong at the time).  When I
installed from source I set the gid and uid to be what the webserver was
using and didn't do the suexec thing.

--Rob
 
-- System Information:
Debian Release: testing/unstable
  APT prefers testing
  APT policy: (500, 'testing')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell:  /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Kernel: Linux 2.6.12-1-386
Locale: LANG=en_US, LC_CTYPE=en_US (charmap=ISO-8859-1)

Versions of packages mailman depends on:
ii  adduser                       3.87       Add and remove users and groups
ii  apache2-mpm-prefork [httpd]   2.0.55-4   traditional model for Apache2
ii  cron                          3.0pl1-94  management of regular background p
ii  debconf [debconf-2.0]         1.4.72     Debian configuration management sy
ii  exim4                         4.60-3     metapackage to ease exim MTA (v4) 
ii  exim4-daemon-heavy [mail-tran 4.60-3     exim MTA (v4) daemon with extended
ii  libc6                         2.3.6-7    GNU C Library: Shared libraries
ii  logrotate                     3.7.1-3    Log rotation utility
ii  pwgen                         2.05-1     Automatic Password generation
ii  python                        2.3.5-5    An interactive high-level object-o
ii  ucf                           2.009      Update Configuration File: preserv

Versions of packages mailman recommends:
ii  base-passwd                   3.5.11     Debian base system master password

-- debconf information:
  mailman/queue_files_present:
* mailman/default_server_language: en
  mailman/update_passwords:
  mailman/gate_news: false
  mailman/update_aliases:
* mailman/site_languages: en
* mailman/used_languages: en
* mailman/create_site_list: