Permission denied when opening file as root with mode 777

chefpermissionssyslog-ng

I'm attempting to install and run syslog-ng but I'm blocked with the following error.

Error opening configuration file; filename='/etc/syslog-ng/syslog-ng.conf', error='Permission denied (13)'

I'm running this with sudo and the file and directory now both have 777 permissions. I've used strace and it's definitely an open call that's failing with EACCESS. As far as we can tell it does not change to be another user.

Update:
As requested: strace output

[edward.sargisson@apps-mgmt-fe1 syslog-ng]$ sudo strace -f -v -eopen /etc/init.d/syslog-ng start
open("/etc/ld.so.cache", O_RDONLY)      = 3
open("/lib64/libtermcap.so.2", O_RDONLY) = 3
open("/lib64/libdl.so.2", O_RDONLY)     = 3
open("/lib64/libc.so.6", O_RDONLY)      = 3
open("/dev/tty", O_RDWR|O_NONBLOCK)     = 3
open("/usr/lib/locale/locale-archive", O_RDONLY) = 3
open("/proc/meminfo", O_RDONLY)         = 3
open("/usr/lib64/gconv/gconv-modules.cache", O_RDONLY) = 3
open("/etc/init.d/syslog-ng", O_RDONLY) = 3
open("/etc/init.d/functions", O_RDONLY) = 3
Process 4802 attached (waiting for parent)
Process 4802 resumed (parent 4801 ready)
Process 4803 attached (waiting for parent)
Process 4803 resumed (parent 4802 ready)
Process 4802 suspended
[pid  4803] open("/etc/ld.so.cache", O_RDONLY) = 3
[pid  4803] open("/lib64/libc.so.6", O_RDONLY) = 3
Process 4802 resumed
Process 4803 detached
[pid  4802] --- SIGCHLD (Child exited) @ 0 (0) ---
Process 4802 detached
--- SIGCHLD (Child exited) @ 0 (0) ---
open("/etc/profile.d/lang.sh", O_RDONLY) = 3
open("/etc/sysconfig/i18n", O_RDONLY)   = 3
open("/etc/sysconfig/init", O_RDONLY)   = 3
open("/usr/share/locale/locale.alias", O_RDONLY) = 3
open("/usr/share/locale/en_US.UTF-8/LC_MESSAGES/initscripts.mo", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/usr/share/locale/en_US.utf8/LC_MESSAGES/initscripts.mo", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/usr/share/locale/en_US/LC_MESSAGES/initscripts.mo", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No    such file or directory)
open("/usr/share/locale/en.UTF-8/LC_MESSAGES/initscripts.mo", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/usr/share/locale/en.utf8/LC_MESSAGES/initscripts.mo", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/usr/share/locale/en/LC_MESSAGES/initscripts.mo", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/etc/sysconfig/syslog-ng", O_RDONLY) = 3
Process 4804 attached (waiting for parent)
Process 4804 resumed (parent 4801 ready)
Process 4801 suspended
[pid  4804] open("/etc/ld.so.cache", O_RDONLY) = 3
[pid  4804] open("/lib64/libnsl.so.1", O_RDONLY) = 3
[pid  4804] open("/lib64/librt.so.1", O_RDONLY) = 3
[pid  4804] open("/lib64/libnet.so.1", O_RDONLY) = 3
[pid  4804] open("/lib64/libdl.so.2", O_RDONLY) = 3
[pid  4804] open("/lib64/libc.so.6", O_RDONLY) = 3
[pid  4804] open("/lib64/libpthread.so.0", O_RDONLY) = 3
[pid  4804] open("/etc/eventlog.conf", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
[pid  4804] open("/etc/localtime", O_RDONLY) = 3
[pid  4804] open("/etc/syslog-ng/syslog-ng.conf", O_RDONLY) = -1 EACCES (Permission denied)
Error opening configuration file; filename='/etc/syslog-ng/syslog-ng.conf', error='Permission denied (13)'
Process 4801 resumed
Process 4804 detached
--- SIGCHLD (Child exited) @ 0 (0) ---

As a test, we moved the syslog-ng.conf somewhere and copied it back – which made it work but doesn't help. If I use chef to replace the file then syslog-ng will not start.

Best Answer

Okay, that turned out to be a SELinux-related problem. Just for the record, /var/log/audit/audit.log can be examined to get SELinux-related events, auditd should be started to enable this log. There are two possible solutions: to disable SELinux (not recommended) or to create a custom SELinux policy which allows access to this file. Maybe the file just does not have proper security context associated with it, the custom policy is not needed then.

Questioner adds: Using ls -Z I can now see that the file has the context of user_u:object_r:tmp_t. My guess is that chef copies the file in from the chef server and it gets the tmp_t context. However, the file needs the default context for /etc which is etc_t. Chef has a selinux cookbook which appears to have the appropriate functionality to control this.

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