SpamAssassin Error

When I click start I get this error:

Failed to start service : The SpamAssassin filter server could not be started

Status: 
Active

Comments

If you SSH into the system and run /etc/init.d/spamd start , what output or error message does it produce?

Also, if that doesn't produce any output, do you see any errors in your email logs?

bislinks's picture
Submitted by bislinks on Sat, 01/25/2014 - 23:25 Pro Licensee

/etc/init.d/spamd start -bash: /etc/init.d/spamd: No such file or directory

Are there any files matching /etc/init.d/spam* on your system?

bislinks's picture
Submitted by bislinks on Sun, 01/26/2014 - 21:24 Pro Licensee

O think not. Here is output of ls /etc/init.d/

acpid gpm motion rpcgssd anacron haldaemon multipathd rpcidmapd apmd halt mysqld rpcsvcgssd atd hddtemp named saslauthd atop hplip netconsole sendmail auditd httpd netfs setroubleshoot autofs ibmasm netplugd single avahi-daemon ip6tables network smartd avahi-dnsconfd ipmi NetworkManager smb bgpd iptables nfs snmpd capi irda nfslock snmptrapd clamd-virtualmin irqbalance nscd spamassassin clamd-wrapper iscsi ntpd squid conman iscsid oddjobd sshd cpuspeed isdn ospf6d svnserve crond kdump ospfd syslog cups killall pcscd tcsd cups-config-daemon krb524 portmap tomcat5 dc_client kudzu postfix usermin dc_server ldap postgresql vncserver dhcdbd lircd postgrey wdaemon dhcpd lm_sensors proftpd webmin dhcrelay lookup-domain psacct winbind dkim-milter lvm2-monitor rawdevices wpa_supplicant dnsmasq mailman rdisc xfs dovecot mcstrans readahead_early ypbind firstboot mdmonitor readahead_later yum-updatesd freenx-server mdmpd restorecond zebra functions messagebus ripd fuse microcode_ctl ripngd

Try running this particular command, what output does this produce:

/etc/init.d/spamassassin start

bislinks's picture
Submitted by bislinks on Sun, 01/26/2014 - 21:51 Pro Licensee

/etc/init.d/spamassasin start -bash: /etc/init.d/spamassasin: No such file or directory

It looks like you may have spelled "spamassassin" incorrectly in your command above... I do see "spamassassin" in the /etc/init.d directory you have there.

bislinks's picture
Submitted by bislinks on Sun, 01/26/2014 - 23:08 Pro Licensee

Sorry for the typo.

/etc/init.d/spamassassin start Starting spamd: child process [24134] exited or timed out without signaling production of a PID file: exit 255 at /usr/bin/spamd line 2588. [FAILED]

Okay, thanks! Next step -- what is the output of these two commands:

rpm -qa | grep spam
cat /etc/resolv.conf
bislinks's picture
Submitted by bislinks on Sun, 01/26/2014 - 23:23 Pro Licensee

rpm -qa | grep spam spamassassin-3.3.1-4.el5

cat /etc/resolv.conf

Generated by NetworkManager

domain gateway.pace.com search gateway.pace.com nameserver 108.90.217.142

Okay, it looks like you only have one nameserver, and it's not pointed at your Virtualmin system... is that your desired setup?

While I haven't run into the error you're seeing before, I did some research, and discovered that one possible cause of that is malfunctioning DNS.

Also, I'm curious what output this command produces:

host software.virtualmin.com

bislinks's picture
Submitted by bislinks on Mon, 01/27/2014 - 08:02 Pro Licensee

This server/machine is actually is my second nameserver! First being ns03.

That means, may be, there's some problem with my DNS setup/config.

Here is output of host software.virtualmin.com : software.virtualmin.com has address 108.60.199.107 software.virtualmin.com mail is handled by 5 mail.software.virtualmin.com.

Out put of host ns04.bislinks.com : ns04.bislinks.com has address 108.90.217.139

Hmm, that actually seems to be functioning properly. Though, in most cases, you'd want to list "127.0.0.0.1" as a nameserver in /etc/resolv.conf.

Doing some further digging, I see that another possible cause of what you're seeing can be from a problem with the rule files.

Try running this command:

sa-update

And then after that, attempt starting SpamAssassin:

/etc/init.d/spamassassin start

Does that help?

bislinks's picture
Submitted by bislinks on Mon, 01/27/2014 - 15:52 Pro Licensee

sa-update Undefined subroutine &Scalar::Util::tainted called at /usr/lib/perl5/5.8.8/i386-linux-thread-multi/File/Spec/Unix.pm line 152.

That message is okay -- does SpamAssassin start after running that?

bislinks's picture
Submitted by bislinks on Mon, 01/27/2014 - 16:04 Pro Licensee

Yes it did!!!!!

bislinks's picture
Submitted by bislinks on Mon, 01/27/2014 - 16:07 Pro Licensee

So, was the problem mainly on account of not having 127.0.0.1 in resolv.conf

It sounds like the SpamAssassin rules database had somehow become corrupted.

It's difficult to say why that might have occurred, I haven't actually run into that before. However, looking around online, it sounds like it's a SpamAssassin bug that occasionally comes up.