bugThe nmh Mail Handling System - Bugs: bug #788, MacOS X: inc can't lock

 
 

bug #788: MacOS X: inc can't lock

Submitted by:  Scott Lipcon <slipcon>
Submitted on:  Tue 02 Jul 2002 01:37:23 PM UTC  
 
Category: compatibilitySeverity: 3 - Normal
Priority: 5 - NormalStatus: Invalid
Assigned to: NoneOpen/Closed: Closed

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Wed 23 Apr 2008 09:28:59 PM UTC, comment #3:

On further investigation, it looks like MacOSX uses Postfix. So you can query the locking style like this:

b144-mcv1-mlt:nmh pm215$ postconf mailbox_delivery_lock
mailbox_delivery_lock = flock, dotlock

For dotlocking you need write access to /var/mail. So this means either (a) make inc setgid mail or (b) use flock locking. (b) is definitely preferable, so configure --with-locking=flock is the Right Thing.

So I'm closing this bug report as invalid.

Peter Maydell <pm215>
Project Administrator
Tue 31 Jan 2006 10:40:48 PM UTC, comment #2:

>I undefined DOT_LOCKING and defined FLOCK_LOCKING
>and the recompiled. inc works fine for me


So is this a bug at all? It sounds as if it's just that MacOS X uses a different locking style -- and you need to tell configure, we can't guess ('dot' is just the default). But you really need to find out rather than trying stuff to see what works -- if you pick wrong you could have something that mostly works fine but occasionally mangles your email.

NB: the correct way to pick a locking method is
./configure --with-locking=flock
(or dot, fcntl or lockf), not post-hoc editing of config.h.

Peter Maydell <pm215>
Project Administrator
Tue 28 Jan 2003 12:53:29 PM UTC, comment #1:

I ran the configure script and then took a look at config.h.
I undefined DOT_LOCKING and defined FLOCK_LOCKING and the
recompiled. inc works fine for me on 10.2.3

/var is a symlink to private/var. There may be some restriction on setuid programs following links.

Jack Skoda <jskoda>
Project Member
Tue 02 Jul 2002 01:37:23 PM UTC, original submission:

from Jon Stewart

So, I got nmh to install just fine after changing INSTALL to
README.install (as noted, one can use .PHONY in the makefile). To any
Macheads out there, I'm happy to report that you can specify "bbedit" as
your editor in ~/.mh_profile and work with messages in BBEdit as long
as save the draft files before answering Whatnow.

But, alas, I'm getting the dreaded "inc: unable to lock..." error.

Known:

1. Mail is being delivered to /var/mail/jon just fine, via Postfix.

2. ls -l /var/mail/jon reveals:

-rw------- 1 jon mail 1095 Jun 24 17:31 /var/mail/jon

3. I ran "chgrp -R mail /usr/local/nmh" in case it was a group permissions
problem; previously, nmh was in group wheel. This had no discernible
effect.

4. Per the faq's suggestion, I added:

lockldir:
lockstyle: 1

to the mts.conf file. This had no discernible effect.

5. I have no clue how locking should be done in MacOS X.

Any thoughts?

Scott Lipcon <slipcon>
Project Member

 

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    Date Changed By Updated Field Previous Value => Replaced By
    Wed 23 Apr 2008 09:28:59 PM UTCpm215StatusNone=>Invalid
      Open/ClosedOpen=>Closed

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