Subject: Config file not changeable, can't change options or settings

From: James Cummings <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Nov 2003 12:30:58 +0000 (GMT)

Hiya,

Using pine4.58 whenever I try and Take something to a filter from
anything other than my INBOX (and sometimes even there)
I get the message:

[Config file not changeable, can't change options or settings]

Sometimes quiting pine entirely and restarting it solves the
problem, sometimes it doesn't.

my ~/.pinerc is user/group/other rwx.

 Any suggestions?

 -James

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Dr James Cummings, Oxford Text Archive, [email-masked]
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From: Mats Dufberg <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Nov 2003 20:04:21 +0100 (CET)

> my ~/.pinerc is user/group/other rwx.

I could imagen that pine does not like the file to have such lax
permission. Try "chmod 644" or "chmod 640" on the file.

Mats

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Mats Dufberg                                      [email-masked]
Blaoarvsgraend 42                                  +46-8-38 48 59
SE-162 45 Vaellingby, Sweden                      +46-70-258 2588

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From: Steve Hubert <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 14 Nov 2003 14:53:25 -0800 (PST)

Make sure the directory in which the pinerc file is contained is also
writeable.

Steve Hubert <[email-masked]>
Networks and Distributed Computing, Univ. of Washington, Seattle

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From: James Cummings <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 17 Nov 2003 09:53:16 +0000 (GMT)

> Networks and Distributed Computing, Univ. of Washington, Seattle

Yup, it seems to be.  (though why I should have to make my home
directory world writeable to be able to save pine config is beyond
me.  Surely this is a security flaw??)  I still occasionally get
the error in any case.

-James

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From: James Cummings <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 17 Nov 2003 10:06:41 +0000 (GMT)

> permission. Try "chmod 644" or "chmod 640" on the file.

Nope, 600, 604 640 doesn't matter, still get the same error message.
Doesn't seem to matter whether I have extremely lax permissions (world
rw or rwx) or extremely tight ones (only user rw) or anywhere in
between.

-James

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From: Steve Hubert <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 17 Nov 2003 11:34:37 -0800 (PST)

> me.  Surely this is a security flaw??)  I still occasionally get

Sorry, I didn't mean world writeable, just writeable by you.

Are there any clues in the .pine-debug* file when this happens? If you can
reproduce at will, you could run pine with lots of debugging

   pine -d verbose=9,imap=4

and if you would send the resulting debug file to us at
[email-masked], we'll take a look at it. Thanks.

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From: James Cummings <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Nov 2003 11:42:49 +0000 (GMT)

> reproduce at will, you could run pine with lots of debugging

I would love to but:

jamesc@crow:~$ pine -d verbose=9,imap=4
Argument Error: unknown flag "d", debugging not compiled in

so no .pine-debug* files either. :-(

Not my system so I'm unable to recompile pine either.  Sorry that
this isn't very helpful.

The various folders (inbox, read-mail, etc.) are on a remote
server using ssl if that helps...

It seems to happen more frequently when I'm 'T'aking from a
message in read-mail to a Filter... it has never happened
'T'aking to my addressbook.

Any other suggestions?

-James
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From: Steve Hubert <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 18 Nov 2003 17:35:00 -0800 (PST)

That ought to mean that the config file is readonly for some reason. That
should mean that Setup/Config fails the same as Take to a Filter. Take to
an address book is a little different, because it is writing into the
address book, not the config file. When you get the failure taking to a
filter you will probably also get it if you try Setup/Config.

I'm not sure how it could be failing some of the time and not other times.
It's hard to debug without further debug info.

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From: James Cummings <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2003 14:07:35 +0000 (GMT)

> filter you will probably also get it if you try Setup/Config.

Nope, the setup/config never has claimed to be unchangeable.

> It's hard to debug without further debug info.

*shrug* ok, I'll send it to the support people here.  At least to see if
they can turn on debugging.

-James

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From: Steve Hubert <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2003 17:32:56 -0800 (PST)

James,
  Thanks very much for taking the time to compile it and send the debug
file. Here's a simple patch that should fix this problem. It will be
included in the next pine. Thanks!

*** other.c.dist	Thu Nov 20 17:22:00 2003
--- other.c.new	Thu Nov 20 17:22:43 2003
***************
*** 13486,13505 ****
--- 13486,13507 ----
  	    if(rtype == 'f')
  	      defpat->patgrp->fldr_type = FLDR_SPECIFIC;

  	    defpat->patgrp->folder = string_to_pattern(s);
  	    fs_give((void **)&s);
  	}
      }

      role_type_print(title, "ADD NEW %sRULE", rflags);

+     opt_screen = NULL;
+
      if(role_config_edit_screen(ps, defpat, title, rflags,
  			       &newpat) == 1 && newpat){

  	if(ps->never_allow_changing_from && newpat->action &&
  	   newpat->action->from)
  	    q_status_message(SM_ORDER|SM_DING, 3, 7,
        "Site policy doesn't allow changing From address so From is ignored");

  	if(rflags & ROLE_DO_ROLES && newpat->patgrp && newpat->patgrp->nick){
  	    PAT_S *pat;

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From: James Cummings <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2003 12:00:55 +0000 (GMT)

> included in the next pine. Thanks!

That change has fixed the problem (or at least I couldn't duplicated it
in about 10 attempts).  Thanks very much for the prompt help.  Those
running the systems don't want to recompile it, so I've just stuck
the binary in my own ~/bin directory and will live with that until
they upgrade.

many thanks,
-James

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