Initialization failed: Namespace '': mkdir(/var/www/mail) failed: Permission denied

[Aki Tuomi]

> On October 26, 2017 at 5:40 PM trash at skrilnetz.net wrote:
> 
> 
>   Quoting Steffen Kaiser <skdovecot at smail.inf.fh-brs.de>:
> 
> > On Thu, 26 Oct 2017, trash at skrilnetz.net wrote:
> >
> >> /dovecot: lda(www-data): Error: user www-data: Initialization  
> >> failed: Namespace '': MKDIR(/VAR/WWW/MAIL) failed: Permission  
> >> denied (euid=33(www-data) egid=33(www-data) missing +w perm:  
> >> /var/www, dir owned by 1001:1001 mode=0755//)  /
> >>
> >> I did some troubleshooting and I don't understand where  
> >> the MKDIR(/VAR/WWW/MAIL) is coming from. Mailboxes are in /var/mail  
> >> and
> >
> > ^^ /var/mail contains the INBOX only
> >
> >> sending/receiving emails is working as it always did.
> >>
> >> mail_location is still setup to be MAIL_LOCATION =  
> >> MBOX:~/MAIL:INBOX=/VAR/MAIL/%U
> >
> > Everything else is in ~/MAIL (why uppercase?)
> >
> >> Why is it trying a mkdir in /var/www?
> >
> > Because most likely /var/www is the home directory of www-data and  
> > you've configured to use $HOME/MAIL as base directory, which is  
> > /var/www/mail
> > - -- Steffen Kaiser
> 
> I don't know where the uppercase is coming from. In the email I've  
> sent its lower case.
> 
> How can I fix that without changing permissions of /var/www? Where is  
> $HOME/MAIL configured? Why do I get this error now for the first time,  
> when there was no change to the system configuration?

Probably someone attempted to send email via a crappy script and it's now trying to deliver to www-data.

first_valid_uid = 1001
last_valid_uid = 1001

also, doveconf -n would be useful.

Aki