[Dovecot] dovecot rejecting auth after working a few times

[Matthew Thorley]

Sorry Timo your seeing these twice. For some reason my mail client
replied to you and not the list.

Timo > Where does pam authenticate from? Where does passwd (i.e. NSS)
Timo > authenticate from?

I'm not sure about passwd, but pam authentication comes from ldap.

It started failing again. Here are some relevant log entries. The
first few attempts at the top are good, but then it starts to fail,
this time with with a different error than before.

And I am again seeing extra dovecot-auth processes. It does seem that
the problem is related to pam, but I don't understand while it works
for fails, and then works again if I kill off dovecot-auth.

Feb 14 14:32:06 mail dovecot: pop3-login: Login: user=<matthew>,
method=PLAIN, rip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, lip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, TLS
Feb 14 14:32:07 mail dovecot: POP3(matthew): Disconnected: Logged out
top=0/0, retr=0/0, del=0/318, size=5975170
Feb 14 14:32:11 mail dovecot: pop3-login: Login: user=<lindsay>,
method=PLAIN, rip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, lip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, TLS
Feb 14 14:32:11 mail dovecot: pop3-login: Login: user=<lindsay>,
method=PLAIN, rip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, lip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, TLS
Feb 14 14:32:12 mail dovecot: POP3(lindsay): Disconnected: Logged out
top=0/0, retr=0/0, del=0/0, size=0
Feb 14 14:32:12 mail dovecot: POP3(lindsay): Disconnected: Logged out
top=0/0, retr=0/0, del=0/0, size=0
Feb 14 14:33:33 mail dovecot: pop3-login: Disconnected:
rip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, lip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, TLS handshake
Feb 14 14:34:16 mail dovecot: auth(default):
pam(taylor,xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx): PAM child process 17506 timed out,
killing it
Feb 14 14:34:16 mail dovecot: auth(default):
pam(lindsay,xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx): PAM child process 17509 timed out,
killing it
Feb 14 14:34:16 mail dovecot: auth(default):
pam(lindsay,xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx): Child process died
Feb 14 14:34:16 mail dovecot: auth(default):
pam(taylor,xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx): Child process died
Feb 14 14:34:16 mail dovecot: auth(default): PAM: Child 17506 died with signal 9
Feb 14 14:34:16 mail dovecot: auth(default): PAM: Child 17509 died with signal 9
Feb 14 14:34:17 mail dovecot: pop3-login: Aborted login (1
authentication attempts): user=<taylor>, method=PLAIN,
rip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, lip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, TLS
Feb 14 14:34:17 mail dovecot: pop3-login: Aborted login (1
authentication attempts): user=<lindsay>, method=PLAIN,
rip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, lip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, TLS
Feb 14 14:34:26 mail dovecot: auth(default):
pam(matthew,xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx): PAM child process 17517 timed out,
killing it
Feb 14 14:34:26 mail dovecot: auth(default):
pam(matthew,xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx): Child process died
Feb 14 14:34:26 mail dovecot: auth(default): PAM: Child 17517 died with signal 9
Feb 14 14:34:26 mail dovecot: pop3-login: Disconnected:
user=<matthew>, method=PLAIN, rip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx,
lip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, TLS
Feb 14 14:34:46 mail dovecot: auth(default):
pam(traci,xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx): PAM child process 17536 timed out, killing
it
Feb 14 14:34:46 mail dovecot: auth(default):
pam(traci,xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx): Child process died
Feb 14 14:34:46 mail dovecot: auth(default): PAM: Child 17536 died with signal 9
Feb 14 14:34:47 mail dovecot: pop3-login: Aborted login (1
authentication attempts): user=<traci>, method=PLAIN,
rip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, lip=xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx, TLS