VSFTPD on Ubuntu for Joomla! & FTP

[Stoneface]

I am installing Joomla! on my local Ubuntu server. To make Joomla! run smoothly I need FTP access. I decided to install VSFTP

 sudo apt-get install vsftpd

started the service:

 sudo /etc/init.d/vsftpd start

Then I realized I needed to added myself to FTP users. I found info here: http://linux-hacks.blogspot.com/2008...to-vsftpd.html and created vsftpd.chroot_list in /etc/ using

sudo gedit vsftpd.chroot_list

I added my user name and restarted the VSFTP service:

sudo /etc/init.d/vsftpd restart

Then I resumed the J! setup. I entered the FTP details and clicked autofind path. I got the error: "Could not connect to FTP Server"
Any ideas why? Password and user should be correct...

[Stoneface]

made a few changes in vsftpd.conf:

# Uncomment this to allow local users to log in.
local_enable=YES

and

# You may restrict local users to their home directories.  See the FAQ for
# the possible risks in this before using chroot_local_user or
#chroot_list_enable below.
chroot_local_user=YES

Restarted the vsftpd service.

sudo /etc/init.d/vsftpd restart

Had a new error: Not able to auto-detect the FTP root folder

[Stoneface]

I made another change:

# Sets root directory for non-anonymous users
local_root=/var/www/cms

Restarted the service and tried again. Still getting: "Not able to auto-detect the FTP root folder"

Just read:
This option represents a directory which vsftpd will try to change into after a local (i.e. non-anonymous) login. Failure is
silently ignored.
So I guess my chroot is somehow not working??

Here is my vsftpd.conf using

grep -v '^#' /etc/vsftpd.conf

:

listen=YES
anonymous_enable=NO
local_enable=YES
dirmessage_enable=YES
xferlog_enable=YES
connect_from_port_20=YES
ftpd_banner=Welcome to Jubuntu FTP
chroot_local_user=YES
chroot_list_enable=YES
chroot_list_file=/etc/vsftpd.chroot_list
secure_chroot_dir=/var/run/vsftpd
pam_service_name=vsftpd
rsa_cert_file=/etc/ssl/certs/ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem
rsa_private_key_file=/etc/ssl/private/ssl-cert-snakeoil.key
local_root=/var/www/cms

[Stoneface]

New vsftpd.conf

listen=YES
anonymous_enable=NO
local_enable=YES
write_enable=YES
local_umask=022
dirmessage_enable=YES
xferlog_enable=YES
connect_from_port_20=YES
xferlog_std_format=YES
ftpd_banner=Welcome to Jubuntu FTP
chroot_local_user=YES
chroot_list_enable=YES
chroot_list_file=/etc/vsftpd.chroot_list
secure_chroot_dir=/var/run/vsftpd
pam_service_name=vsftpd
rsa_cert_file=/etc/ssl/certs/ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem
rsa_private_key_file=/etc/ssl/private/ssl-cert-snakeoil.key

When I use this configuration:

listen=YES
anonymous_enable=NO
local_enable=YES
write_enable=YES
local_umask=022
dirmessage_enable=YES
xferlog_enable=YES
connect_from_port_20=YES
xferlog_std_format=YES
ftpd_banner=Welcome to Jubuntu FTP
chroot_local_user=YES
secure_chroot_dir=/var/run/vsftpd
pam_service_name=vsftpd
rsa_cert_file=/etc/ssl/certs/ssl-cert-snakeoil.pem
rsa_private_key_file=/etc/ssl/private/ssl-cert-snakeoil.key

No change either...
Still no FTP root path found!!!! Anybody????

[Stoneface]

The funny thing is that I can FTP to my local server now

me@my-laptop:/etc$ ftp localhost
Connected to localhost.
220 Welcome to Jubuntu FTP
Name (localhost:me): me
331 Please specify the password.
Password:
230 Login successful.
Remote system type is UNIX.
Using binary mode to transfer files.

So why can't joomla! find the ftp root path???

[Stoneface]

Maybe it has something to do with user permissions on my box?
The joomla! folder is now in the group www-data and so is the user (me) I use to access the server by ftp. I can FTP to the localhost without any problems and wind up in the root folder I have set in the vsftpd.conf... So what is the problem here?

[Stoneface]

Well I used / as path to ftp root. Finished the installation and removed the installation file. Now when I want to upload and unpack a component I have to enter FTP data. And then I still have issues:

JFTP::store: Bad response Warning! Failed to move file.

This is starting to bug me... So I checked the file permissions on my joomla folder and saw this:

drwxr-xr-x 16 www-data   33     4096 2009-09-27 15:42 joomla

well I

sudo chown -R me /var/www/joomla

and got this doing ls -l

drwxr-xr-x 16 me   33     4096 2009-09-27 15:42 joomla

Now I still need to replace 33 by an actual existing group..
Did that

sudo chgrp -R me joomla

Then I added the ftp details to configuration.php and all was cool. I guess it was a basic file and group permission issue in the end.