[Dovecot] pop3 authentication problems: Still got 'em...

[Bruce Lane]

Fellow users,

	This is just a heads-up to let the list know that I'm still unable to get ANY sort of pop3 or pop3s authentication to work with Dovecot.

	Just as a sanity check, I set up an entirely separate system, running FreeBSD 6.1 production, postfix 2.3, and Dovecot 1.0rc2, as a testbed. I got the exact same problem that I had with the NetBSD 3.0 production server, specifically that Dovecot refuses to authenticate a user with either basic pop3 or pop3s.

	The way I see it, I may as well try to get basic pop3 working first. If it doesn't, pop3s will never work.

	This first quote is taken from the mail client (Pegasus) trying to establish a regular, unencrypted pop3 session.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-

[*] Connection established to 192.168.42.80
>> 0058 +OK AVG POP3 Proxy Server 7.1.368/7.1.394 [268.10.1/389]
<< 0013 USER kyrrin
>> 0005 +OK
<< 0016 PASS XXXXXXXXX
>> 0029 -ERR Authentication failed.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

	As you can see, the user ID of 'kyrrin' is getting passed as just that, and Dovecot at least seems to recognize it. I say this as a prefix to the next log clip, which will be the corresponding entry from /var/log/maillog, in which the user name is being presented (for whatever reason) in FQDN format.

	Note that pam was added just as an experiment. It failed too, despite the presence of a 'dovecot' file, containing the following, in /etc/pam.d

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

pioneer# cat /etc/pam.d/dovecot
auth    required        pam_unix.so nullok
account required        pam_unix.so
pioneer#

-=-==-=-=-=-=-

	This would be the /var/log/maillog entry corresponding to the above-referenced Pegasus session.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Jul 16 11:24:38 pioneer dovecot: auth(default): client in: AUTH 1       PLAIN   service=POP3    lip=192.168.42.80rip=192.168.42.40       resp=AGt5cnJpbgBocDIxZHZlbTc=
Jul 16 11:24:38 pioneer dovecot: auth(default): pam(kyrrin at bluefeathertech.com,192.168.42.40): pam_authenticate() failed: authentication error
Jul 16 11:24:38 pioneer dovecot: auth(default): cache(kyrrin at bluefeathertech.com,192.168.42.40): User unknown
Jul 16 11:24:40 pioneer dovecot: auth(default): client out: FAIL        1       user=kyrrin at bluefeathertech.com
Jul 16 11:24:49 pioneer dovecot: pop3-login: Aborted login: user=<kyrrin at bluefeathertech.com>, method=PLAIN, rip=192.168.42.40, lip=192.168.42.80

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

	This next bit is the auth default section of my dovecot.conf file. Other sections, or the entire file, can be posted upon request.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

auth default {
  # Space separated list of wanted authentication mechanisms:
  #   plain login digest-md5 cram-md5 ntlm rpa apop anonymous gssapi
mechanisms = plain login
        passdb pam {
        }
        passdb passwd {
        }
        userdb passwd {
        }
        socket listen {
        client {
        path = /var/spool/postfix/private/auth
        mode = 0660
        user = postfix
        group = postfix
                }
        }
}

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

	I've posted a similar note to bsdforums, in the hope that someone there is (successfully) using Dovecot with pop3 and pop3s.

	Thanks in advance for any assistance. I'm really starting to get seriously upset about this, enough to give thought to qpopper over Dovecot.


-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Bruce Lane, Owner & Head Hardware Heavy,
Blue Feather Technologies -- http://www.bluefeathertech.com
kyrrin (at) bluefeathertech do/t c=o=m
"If Salvador Dali had owned a computer, would it have been equipped with surreal ports?"