RHBA-2008:0703 - Bug Fix Advisory

Topic

An updated logrotate package that fixes various bugs and adds an
enhancement is now available.

Description

The logrotate utility simplifies the administration of multiple log files.
Logrotate allows for automatic rotation, compression, removal, and mailing
of log files.

This updated logrotate package includes fixes for the following bugs:

• encountering a configuration file ending with a taboo extension, such as

one ending with the tilde character ('~'), was reported as an error.

• logrotate would stop rotating logs when an error in reading the

configuration file occurred. logrotate has been made more robust when it
encounters errors in the configuration file.

• if a system was in SELinux enforcing mode, logrotate would assume that

all files had the necessary attributes, and would stop rotating files when
it encountered files without them.

• logrotate ignored pre/postrotating script arguments.
• using wildcards in taboo extension definitions was not supported.
• the missingok option was ignored when rotating a log specified with a

wildcard.

• a segmentation fault sometimes occurred due to incorrect handling of

configuration file syntax.

In addition, the following enhancement has been added to logrotate:

• logrotate in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4 did not support the maxage and

dateext configuration parameters. Usage of these parameters has been
backported and is now available to users of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4.

Users are advised to upgrade to this updated logrotate package, which
resolves these issues.

Solution

Before applying this update, make sure that all previously-released
errata relevant to your system have been applied.

This update is available via Red Hat Network. Details on how to use
the Red Hat Network to apply this update are available at
http://kbase.redhat.com/faq/FAQ_58_10188

Affected Products

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 4 ia64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 4 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 4 ia64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Workstation 4 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 4 x86_64
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux Desktop 4 i386
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems 4 s390x
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for IBM z Systems 4 s390
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux for Power, big endian 4 ppc

Fixes

• BZ - 208538 - Logrotate missing dateext, maxage
• BZ - 211079 - Logrotate complains about taboo extensions
• BZ - 218388 - Logrotate should rotate logs even if there are some errors on the configuration
• BZ - 219767 - Logrotate can not rotate files on non-selinux filesystem
• BZ - 241766 - Logrotate ignores pre/postrotating scripts arguments
• BZ - 417771 - logrotate missingok option ignored if wildcards are used
• BZ - 440202 - logrotate causes segmentation faults

CVEs

(none)

References

(none)