[Bug 113586] Re: pam wedges, preventing user login, when homedir is openafs mounted and unreadable

[Launchpad Bug Tracker]

[Expired for pam (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60
days.]

** Changed in: pam (Ubuntu)
       Status: Incomplete => Expired

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/113586

Title:
  pam wedges, preventing user login, when homedir is openafs mounted and
  unreadable

Status in “pam” package in Ubuntu:
  Expired

Bug description:
  Been trying to track down a problem with my new ubuntu 7.04 install
  for a week or two.  The issue manifests when I come in to work each
  morning.  At that point my workstation is typically showing a
  screensaver.  The screensaver is running and the machine is not hung.
  However usually when I try to unlock the screensaver and return to my
  user session that process wedges.

  What is a real bummer is that though I can switch to another VT and
  try to login there, that *also* wedges if I try to login as myself.

  Logging in as root on a VT does work, but if as root I try to su to my
  normal user, that too wedges.  Stracing such an attempt finally led me
  to a hint: the strace showed that the process wedged exactly while
  trying to stat64 .pam_environment in my homedir.  Boo.  Likely my
  homedir is not readable at this point as my AFS tokens have very well
  expired.

  This appears to be due to a recent patch in pam, "Patch 100
  (renumbered from 060): Look at ~/.pam_environment too".  I couldn't
  find user (admin) documentation for this code, but reading the source
  I see that there  should be an option user_read_env which if set to
  zero should prevent PAM from trying to read the offending file.  It
  appears that the default configuration did NOT have this set, so it
  was trying to read the file.  And wedging.  I adjusted every call to
  pam_env.so in /etc/pam.d/* to have user_read_env=0.

  I'm typing this before I've actually waited 24 hours to verify that
  the problem is solved (remember, it typically only manifests when I
  arrive in the morning...).  I'll append to the bug report if I come in
  tomorrow and the problem persists.

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