Your message dated Sat, 16 Aug 2025 12:44:12 +0100 with message-id <CAJ3BuoSi_i5Smf1yJzE5hTmS+Jpz7W=jxhtn608866r-dvv...@mail.gmail.com> and subject line Re: logcheck: improve support for non-POSIX charsets in generated report has caused the Debian Bug report #630721, regarding logcheck: improve support for non-POSIX charsets in generated report to be marked as done.
This means that you claim that the problem has been dealt with. If this is not the case it is now your responsibility to reopen the Bug report if necessary, and/or fix the problem forthwith. (NB: If you are a system administrator and have no idea what this message is talking about, this may indicate a serious mail system misconfiguration somewhere. Please contact [email protected] immediately.) -- 630721: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=630721 Debian Bug Tracking System Contact [email protected] with problems
--- Begin Message ---Package: logcheck Version: 1.2.69 Severity: normal Tags: l10n My system is setup with non-POSIX default locale (see below), using UTF-8 character encoding. This leads to many lines inside various log files (e.g. /var/log/syslog) containing 'german umlaut' characters (äöüÄÖÜß). During normal system usage in bash, less, vi etc. everything works as expected - all characters are shown correctly. However, logcheck behaves different: report sent by e-mail contain unreadable characters instead of 'german umlaut' characters. Before sending this bug report, I investigated thoroughly what is causing the problem and was able to find the culprit. I was also able to solve the problem for me - but it did cost me a couple of hours, which is driving me to report this as a bug. To be clear about this issue: I'm totally aware, that system log files may contain all kind of encoded characters, making this problem really unsolvable in a 100% complete manner. On the other hand, in real life things can be improved significantly, using a more lax approach. In fact I believe, that most systems are using only one locale for system administration, which makes the solution of this problem (at least in my case) quite simple. ........Details....... The script /usr/sbin/logcheck is usually run by the cron deamon, based on /etc/cron.d/logcheck. This process runs in POSIX locale (LC_ALL=POSIX, LANG=POSIX), despite /etc/default/locale being possibly set to a different locale. Inside /usr/sbin/logcheck, the function sendreport() uses mail(1) or nail(1) to deliver the report via e-mail. Additionally, sending report as an attachment depends on nail(1) beeing installed. By default, reports are sent 'inline' (not as an attachment), which results in mail(1) beeing used. Unfortunately mail(1) is responsible for the characterset issue, as it does ignore the locale settings completely. All of this could be simplified and improved, when using mutt(1) instead: + produces correct encoding of e-mails, depending on locale settings + is able to send attachments using '-a' option In my case, I did the following to solve the problem: 1. added the following line to /etc/cron.d/logcheck LC_ALL=de_DE.UTF-8 2. changed sendreport() funtion in /usr/sbin/logcheck: sendreport() { MAILER=${MAILER:-mutt} if [ $REBOOT -eq 1 ]; then subject="Reboot: $HOSTNAME $DATE $*" else subject="$HOSTNAME $DATE $*" fi if [ $ADDTAG = "yes" ]; then subject="[logcheck] $subject" fi if [ $MAILOUT -eq 1 ]; then debug "Sending report to STDOUT" cat $TMPDIR/report debug "Sent report to STDOUT" else debug "Sending report: '$subject' to $SENDMAILTO" if [ $MAILASATTACH -eq 1 ]; then debug "Sending report as attachment" if command -v $MAILER >/dev/null; then echo -e "Report attached" | $MAILER -s "$subject" -a "$TMPDIR/report" "$SENDMAILTO" return $? else echo >> $TMPDIR/report echo Could not send report as attachment, $MAILER not installed >> $TMPDIR/report fi fi cat $TMPDIR/report | $MAILER -s "$subject" "$SENDMAILTO" fi } Here is the diff-output showing my changes: # diff /usr/sbin/logcheck logcheck 284d283 < MAILER=${MAILER:-mutt} 302,303c301,302 < if command -v $MAILER >/dev/null; then < echo -e "Report attached" | $MAILER -s "$subject" -a "$TMPDIR/report" "$SENDMAILTO" --- > if command -v nail >/dev/null; then > echo -e "Report attached" | nail -s "$subject" -a > "$TMPDIR/report" "$SENDMAILTO" 307c306 < echo Could not send report as attachment, $MAILER not installed >> $TMPDIR/report --- > echo Could not send report as attachment, nail not installed >> > $TMPDIR/report 310c309 < cat $TMPDIR/report | $MAILER -s "$subject" "$SENDMAILTO" --- > cat $TMPDIR/report | mail -s "$subject" "$SENDMAILTO" 319a319 > Regards, Nenad. -- System Information: Debian Release: 5.0.8 APT prefers oldstable APT policy: (500, 'oldstable') Architecture: i386 (i686) Kernel: Linux 2.6.26-2-686 (SMP w/1 CPU core) Locale: LANG=de_DE.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=de_DE.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8) Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash Versions of packages logcheck depends on: ii adduser 3.110 add and remove users and groups ii bsd-mailx [mailx] 8.1.2-0.20071201cvs-3 A simple mail user agent ii cron 3.0pl1-105 management of regular background p ii exim4 4.69-9+lenny4 metapackage to ease Exim MTA (v4) ii exim4-daemon-heavy 4.69-9+lenny4 Exim MTA (v4) daemon with extended ii lockfile-progs 0.1.11-0.1 Programs for locking and unlocking ii logtail 1.2.69 Print log file lines that have not ii mailx 1:20071201-3 Transitional package for mailx ren ii rsyslog [system-lo 3.18.6-4 enhanced multi-threaded syslogd Versions of packages logcheck recommends: ii logcheck-database 1.2.69 database of system log rules for t Versions of packages logcheck suggests: pn syslog-summary <none> (no description available) -- no debconf information
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--- Begin Message ---On Thu, 23 May 2024 20:50:22 +0100 Richard Lewis <[email protected]> wrote: > TLDR: some time in the last 15 years, this bug against logcheck has > been fixed, as far as i can tell > > My system is setup with non-POSIX default locale (see below), using UTF-8 > > character encoding. > > Inside /usr/sbin/logcheck, the function sendreport() uses mail(1) or nail(1) > > logcheck now uses mime-construct(1) instead of either of these > > > By default, reports are sent 'inline' (not as an attachment) > > This can also be controlled with the MAILASATTACH option > mime-construct allows the charset to be set using the MIMEENCODING > option in logcheck.conf > > So i think we can close this bug. A year later: closing, as it appears to be fixed. If there are issues with locales in logcheck, please open a new bug with the details
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