Change reserved usernames for use by Virtualmin

Submitted by Analog on Fri, 04/15/2016 - 11:53

Currently Virtualmin reserves the following 3 names (possibly more?) which can not be used as usernames or email address names: "logs", "virtualmin-backup", and, "domains".

I understand the need for reserved names in order for internal use by virtualmin but I believe "virtualmin-" should have been appended to "logs" and "domains" just like it was to "virtualmin-backups".

"logs" and "domains" are very commonly used addresses and having virtualmin reserve these names is a turn off for people looking to switch from other control panels to virtualmin where the user already has email addresses such as "domains@example.com". I'm in the process of converting a clients setup from cpanel to virtualmin and this person uses a "domains@example.com" email address as the business contact for all his domain related logins (registrars, ssl certificate providers, etc...) as well as the SOA email for more then 1000 domain records.

Having to change all this because virtualmin reserves the "domains" name is a major hassle that could be avoided if Virtualmin just used "virtualmin-domains", "virtualmin-logs", for internal use.

I will mark this as low priority but i believe it is still a feature that would benefit people.

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Comments

Submitted by JamieCameron on Fri, 04/15/2016 - 19:36

Not all of those should be reserved - what error are you getting exactly when you try to create a mailbox called "domains" ?

Submitted by Analog on Sat, 04/16/2016 - 09:21

This is the output when trying to create "domains@example.com"

"Failed to save mailbox : The username domains is reserved for use by Virtualmin"

Submitted by JamieCameron on Sat, 04/16/2016 - 10:32

Ok, the reason for that is that domains (and the other names) are the names of sub-directories that Virtualmin creates under each domain's home, so allowing a username with the same name would cause them to clash.

Submitted by Analog on Sat, 04/16/2016 - 11:44

Yes i understand the reason for names used internally or for sub-directories but they should all still have "virtualmin-" appended to them so that it does not conflict with usability. In my case I am using a VM with Virtualmin purely as an email server and there are no "domains" directories (that i can see) in the accounts home directory.

It would seem that simply changing the names of these sub directories that are created by Virtualmin would allow users the use of these commonly used names. I've seen many uses for a backup@, logs@, or domains@ email address and while in the case of Virtualmin backup@ is not an issue logs@ and domains@ are.

Submitted by JamieCameron on Sat, 04/16/2016 - 12:34

Unfortunately, renaming these existing directories isn't practical because the current names are used in many different places in the code, and tens of thousands of Virtualmin installs. However, one work-around for this is to create an email alias for domains@yourdomain.com (on Mail Aliases page) that forwards to the actual mailbox with a different name.

Submitted by Analog on Sat, 04/16/2016 - 14:07

Yes I thought about using mail aliases initially as well but unfortunately it seems that Virtualmin will not allow that either.

If i go to "Edit Mail Aliases" -> "Create Mail Alias" and set the Mailbox name to "domains" and set it to forward it to another address i get the following error (also tested with "logs"):

Failed to save alias : Missing or invalid alias name (no @ should be included)

Then I tested with a random domain "domaintest" and it successfully created the alias.

So it seems that "domains" and "logs" can also not be created as aliases.

If you have any other ideas for work arounds I'd gladly give them a try :p

Submitted by JamieCameron on Sat, 04/16/2016 - 15:47

For the alias name, are you entering domains or domains@whatever.com ?

Submitted by Analog on Sat, 04/16/2016 - 16:51

I'm entering just domains or logs which both output the error in my previous comment, i doubled checked by trying domaintest to make sure an alias could be made without issue and that worked.

Submitted by JamieCameron on Sat, 04/16/2016 - 18:06

That's a Virtualmin bug, sorry - it should be possible to have an alias named domains. I will fix this in the next release.

Submitted by Analog on Sat, 04/16/2016 - 19:24

Thank you very much, that is much appreciated. I make sure to keep my installation up to date so i can create these aliases.