System and Network configuration • Debian apt installation/upgrade: configuration error - unknown item 'NONEXISTENT' (notify administrator)

Hello,

during Debian 11 (with IIRC latest 5.x kernel) to Debian 12 apt update/upgrade/dist-upgrade, I have noticed:

Setting up udev (252.30-1~deb12u2) ...
configuration error - unknown item 'NONEXISTENT' (notify administrator)
configuration error - unknown item 'PREVENT_NO_AUTH' (notify administrator)
...
Setting up openssh-client (1:9.2p1-2+deb12u3) ...
configuration error - unknown item 'NONEXISTENT' (notify administrator)
configuration error - unknown item 'PREVENT_NO_AUTH' (notify administrator)

if this is my failure, please how to fix it?

The error messages:are generated by the pwck program [1] from the passwd package [2]:at the following position in the source code:

• sources / shadow / 1:4.16.0-4 / lib / getdef.c at line 434

The program checks if known configuration items are defined in a configuration file (perhaps /etc/login.defs, I assume) comparing them to a list of known configuration items (hard coded in the program itself).

The error messages are probably caused by an not updated pwck program (after a Debian release upgrade) which is unaware of some configuration items or by some unknown configuration items in the configuration files.

As reference, the allowed configuration items in /etc/login.defs can be found here [3].

You can replicate the error with:Check what is the pwck version with:Hope this helps.

--
[1] pwck manual page
[2] passwd
[3] login.defs.5 manual page

Statistics: Posted by Aki — 2024-10-11 23:06 — Replies 1 — Views 87

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