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

[Aki Tuomi]

> On October 26, 2017 at 5:53 PM trash at skrilnetz.net wrote:
> 
> 
>   Quoting Aki Tuomi <aki.tuomi at dovecot.fi>:
> 
> >> 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
> 
> Here is doveconf -n: https://pastebin.com/raw/s6cKwHGc

Home directory is provided by passwd userdb when present in passwd file. to override it, use 

userdb {
   driver = passwd
   override_fields = home=/var/mail/%Lu
}

Aki