Mailscanner not scanning queue

[Glenn Steen]

On 14/12/06, Nate <nate at seekio.com> wrote:
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> Yes, I'm running old versions of postfix and mailscanner, but here are
> my reasons:
>
> 1. I followed the instructions at
> http://www.debian-administration.org/articles/172 which has you install
> all of the packages from apt.  These are the version that were installed.

Ok. While I can see that this has its merits, as you get more comfy
with MailScanner and want it (and SpamAssassin in particular) to have
better hit percentages, you will be wanting to move closer to "latest
stable" of each of those... That at least is my opinionated view:-).

> 2. I did try getting the latest version of Mailscanner since that was my
> first inkling as well.  However, on
> http://www.mailscanner.info/downloads.html I do not see a plain tarball
> source install.  I see installs for redhat, suse, Solaris/BSD, Debian,
> FreeBSD.  I tried to install the Debian version but it's from unstable
> and so it choked on dependencies.  I'm not afraid of installing the
> latest version from a generic tarball, but I did not see that for
> Mailscanner, which I think is odd.  Am I missing something here?  Where
> is the source tarball?  My only other option is to try re-compiling the
> package, which I've done before, but you really can't expect a lot of
> users to know how to do that, and in my experience it doesn't always
> work very well.

The "Solaris/*BSD/Other *nix" package *is* the tarball...
Installs into /opt in a rather self-contained manner. And it'll take
care of perl module dependencies as best it can, provided you don't
have an "insanely" old perl (ISTR 5.6.1 being ok, but might be
wrong)... Worst case, you'll have to get things via cpan. Do the same
with the clam+SA package, and you should be well on your way to
getting the latest'n'greatest (stable) going;-). If you go that way,
you'll have to remove the debs installed by apt for the respective
subsystems (MailScanner, SA and Clam)... But you knew that:-).

There are nice instructions on the official site, as well as in the
MAQ/Wiki ...;)

BTW, the "recompile" step is actually done at execute time ... After
all, this is (mostly) perl;-).

>
> 3. I manage over 200 debian boxes.  When you manage that many,
> consistency is key.  Having a few boxes be in the unstable branch while
> the rest are in stable can cause problems all over the place and make
> your life a living hell.  I know, I've done it before.

So move them all to unstable then... Or do you have a compelling reson
not to do that?
Or move over to Ubuntu... I like a lot of things about that one:-). If
you need long support cycles and semi-old packages, Dapper should be
your best pick. Might also please Desktop users:-D

> So at this point I figured it would be quicker and easier to just ask on
> the list as the author of that install page (Ugo) suggested.  As it is,
> Razor was writing it's log file to the hold queue directory.  So I fixed
> that and we'll see how it goes.

Thought so. This is the _only_ real benefit of using older versions of
things... Most bad bugs are known, and there are ususlly publicly
available workarounds.
Then again, in newer versions... those bugs are likely fixed (and new
ones introduced, yes:-)..

> Thanks, Glenn.
Glad to be of help.
(snip)
Cheers
-- 
-- Glenn
email: glenn < dot > steen < at > gmail < dot > com
work: glenn < dot > steen < at > ap1 < dot > se