Logrotate error for fail2ban

Question

I get the following error when running a cron job, and I'm not too sure how to go about fixing. This is on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS.

test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts --report /etc/cron.daily )

/etc/cron.daily/logrotate:
error: error running non-shared postrotate script for /var/log/fail2ban.log of '/var/log/fail2ban.log '
run-parts: /etc/cron.daily/logrotate exited with return code 1

Here is the contents of /etc/logrotate.d/fail2ban

/var/log/fail2ban.log {

    weekly
    rotate 4
    compress

    delaycompress
    missingok
    postrotate
    fail2ban-client set logtarget /var/log/fail2ban.log >/dev/null
    endscript

    # If fail2ban runs as non-root it still needs to have write access
    # to logfiles.
    # create 640 fail2ban adm
    create 640 root adm
}

Here is the /etc/cron.daily/logrotate file

#!/bin/sh

# Clean non existent log file entries from status file
cd /var/lib/logrotate
test -e status || touch status
head -1 status > status.clean
sed 's/"//g' status | while read logfile date
do
    [ -e "$logfile" ] && echo "\"$logfile\" $date"
done >> status.clean
mv status.clean status

test -x /usr/sbin/logrotate || exit 0
/usr/sbin/logrotate /etc/logrotate.conf

change this line `fail2ban-client set logtarget /var/log/fail2ban.log >/dev/null` to `fail2ban-client set logtarget /var/log/fail2ban.log >/tmp/fail2banclient.out` and then run logrotate and tell us what gets put in `/tmp/fail2banclient.out` — user9517, May 19 '13 at 19:52
@lain I still seem to get the same error: error running non-shared postrotate script for /var/log/fail2ban.log of '/var/log/fail2ban.log ' — Errol Fitzgerald, May 19 '13 at 20:13
@lain The contents of the /tmp/fail2banclient.out are ERROR Unable to contact server. Is it running? — Errol Fitzgerald, May 19 '13 at 20:14

score 9 · Accepted Answer · answered May 19 '13 at 20:24

9

ERROR Unable to contact server. Is it running?

Your fail2ban service isn't running start it!

service fail2ban start

or whatever starts it on your Ubuntu.

answered May 19 '13 at 20:24

user9517

115,471
20
215
297

first check with `service fail2badn status` if it is stopped at all – rubo77 Nov 15 '21 at 08:32

score 4 · Answer 2 · edited Mar 04 '14 at 08:43

4

Add "notifempty" to /etc/logrotate.d/fail2ban. If fail2ban is installed but not running the log will be empty and will not be rotated.

edited Mar 04 '14 at 08:43

Community

1

answered Jan 21 '14 at 08:27

Denis Batten

41
1

Logrotate error for fail2ban

2 Answers2