[Dovecot] Config off by a nuance or a gross?

[Michael Brian Bentley]

Hi,

I am trying to establish an IMAP mail service accessible using a current 
Thunderbird on a laptop.

I used Macports to install Dovecot2 (2.1.5) on an older Snow Leopard Mac 
mini with Intel Core Duo (specifically a Macmini1,1). My goal is to be 
able to run sieve under dovecot2 and offload the email triage from my 
work laptop to the little mail server.

Mail appears to show up on the server just fine. I'm having trouble 
getting Tbird to log in and access properly.

Because there are so many components in play (Tbird, pam, Dovecot2, 
macports, OS X Snow Leopard 10.6.8) (dovecot by itself seems to have 
quite a few settings), it is hard to tell what bit is out of whack.

The message I get from Tbird 13.0.1 for OS X (on Lion) is:

Alert: The IMAP server bentley on TheMini does not support the selected 
authentication method. Please change the 'Authentication method' in the 
'Account Settings | Server settings'.

When I set up the account, Tbird's automatic configuration invents a 
fake mail service based on my domain name, but appears to configure 
things sensibly once I switch to the manual configuration and fill in 
the relevant IP information. It does not appear to care whether it has a 
password or not.

When I set up the account manually on TBird, I let it set up as:

IMAP (ipv4)xx.xxx.xx.xx Port: 143
Connection security: None
Authentication method: Password, transmitted insecurely
SMTP xxxxxxxx.com Port: 587

The dovecot.conf tree includes these:

passdb {
   driver = pam
}

userdb {
   driver = passwd
}

default_login_user = _dovenull

default_internal_user = _dovecot

service imap-login {
   executable = /opt/local/libexec/dovecot/imap-login

   inet_listener imap {
     address = *
     port = 143
   }
}

service imap {
   executable=/opt/local/libexec/dovecot/imap
   process_limit = 1024
}

service lmtp {
   unix_listener lmtp {
   }
}



Issuing the command:

dovecot --build-options

produces:

Build options: ioloop=kqueue notify=kqueue ipv6 openssl io_block_size=8192
Mail storages: shared mdbox sdbox maildir mbox cydir imapc pop3c raw
SQL drivers:
Passdb: checkpassword pam passwd passwd-file
Userdb: checkpassword passwd prefetch passwd-file

The /etc/pam.d/dovecot file contains:

# pop3, imap, smtp : auth account password session
auth       required       pam_opendirectory.so
account    required       pam_permit.so
password   required       pam_deny.so
session    required       pam_permit.so

Dovecot provides the following debug messages on the console when I add 
args = failure_show_msg=yes to passdb in the relevant dovecot conf file:

Jul  1 11:12:38 xx-xxx-xx-xx-nerewhon dovecot[3871]: auth: Debug:auth 
client connected (pid=5047)
Jul  1 11:12:40 xx-xxx-xx-xx-nerewhon dovecot[3871]: imap-login: 
Disconnected (no auth attempts in 2 secs): user=<>, rip=192.168.xx.xx, 
lip=xx.xxx.xx.xx


I recently discovered doveadm and used it with:

doveadm config

to create what I think is the current dovecot.conf file. I hesitate to 
inflict that on the list without being told, "yeah, we need that," there 
may be digest subscribers out there...


I also see these messages show up; they appear unrelated to what I do 
with Tbird:

Jul  1 11:37:33 xx-xxx-xx-xx-nerewhon dovecot[3871]:

auth: Debug: Loading modules from directory: /opt/local/lib/dovecot/auth

auth: Debug: auth client connected (pid=5094)

auth: Debug: client in: AUTH	1	PLAIN	service=imap	secured 
lip=127.0.0.1	rip=127.0.0.1	lport=143	rport=49774

auth: Debug: client out: CONT	1	

auth: Debug: client in: CONT	1	AGJlbnRsZXkAZ3IxbmNo

auth-worker(5100): Debug: Loading modules from directory: 
/opt/local/lib/dovecot/auth

auth-worker(5100): Debug: pam(bentley,127.0.0.1): lookup service=dovecot

auth-worker(5100): Debug: pam(bentley,127.0.0.1): #1/1 style=1 msg=Password:

auth-worker(5100): pam(bentley,127.0.0.1): pam_authenticate() failed: 
authentication error (password mismatch?) (given password: whatever)

auth: Debug: client out: FAIL	1	user=bentley	reason=Password:

auth: Debug: client in: AUTH	2	PLAIN	service=imap	secured 
lip=127.0.0.1	rip=127.0.0.1	lport=143	rport=49774	resp=AGJlbnRsZXkAZ3IxbmNo

auth-worker(5100): Debug: pam(bentley,127.0.0.1): lookup service=dovecot

auth-worker(5100): Debug: pam(bentley,127.0.0.1): #1/1 style=1 msg=Password:

auth-worker(5100): pam(bentley,127.0.0.1): pam_authenticate() failed: 
authentication error (password mismatch?) (given password: whatever)

auth: Debug: client out: FAIL	2	user=bentley	reason=Password:
  imap-login: Disconnected (auth failed, 2 attempts in 9 secs): 
user=<bentley>, method=PLAIN, rip=127.0.0.1, lip=127.0.0.1, secured

auth: Debug: Loading modules from directory: /opt/local/lib/dovecot/auth