vsftpd and local users not working...but configured right (methinks!)
 

I had this working on one machine, not sure why my current one is giving me so much grief. I'm on Debian. I get a 530 error when trying to connect with any user (anonymous worked okay when I had that enabled). I have the user_list and chroot_list files set up with a test username, the user has /bin/bash shell (though changing that doesn't seem to have mattered). Any ideas would be most welcome!

Here's by vsftpd.conf file:

# Access rights
anonymous_enable=YES
local_enable=YES
local_umask=022
write_enable=YES
anon_upload_enable=NO
anon_mkdir_write_enable=NO
anon_other_write_enable=NO

# Users must be in the userlist_file
userlist_enable=YES
userlist_deny=NO
userlist_file=/etc/vsftpd.user_list
chroot_list_enable=YES
chroot_local_user=YES
chroot_list_file=/etc/vsftpd.chroot_list
guest_enable=NO

# Security
anon_world_readable_only=YES
connect_from_port_20=YES
pasv_min_port=50000
pasv_max_port=60000
pasv_promiscuous=YES

# Features
xferlog_enable=YES
ls_recurse_enable=NO
ascii_download_enable=NO
async_abor_enable=NO
ftpd_banner=Welcome to my FTP server!

# Performance
idle_session_timeout=120
data_connection_timeout=300
accept_timeout=60
connect_timeout=60
anon_max_rate=50000

Any help please?

What do you have in your /etc/vsftpd.user_list ?

# cat /etc/vsftpd.user_list
testuser
#

# cat /etc/vsftpd.chroot_list
testuser
#

# grep testuser /etc/passwd
testuser:x:1001:1001:Test FTP User,,,:/home/testuser:/bin/bash
#

Thanks,
:-Phil

from: man vsftpd.conf


chroot_list_enable
If activated, you may provide a list of local users who are placed in a chroot() jail in their home directory upon login. The meaning is slightly different if chroot_local_user is set to YES. In this case, the list becomes a list of users which are NOT to be placed in a chroot() jail.


In other words, if you want to chroot all users, use:
chroot_local_user YES
chroot_list_enable NO

Or if you do enable the list, put a list on non-chrooted users in it. In the current configuration I would expect it to give you the same tree as anonymous.

Have you checked the log yet? It's either in the system log or /var/log/vsftpd.log

Problem is that I get a 530 (access denied) error...I can't get as far as logged in...

Yes, but what does the logfile say?...

Other things I can see to check (that you probably already have):

Does your test user's home directory exist?

Is your userlist readable by the ftp daemon? What permissions does the Daemon run with (root, ftp, etc.)? what are the ownership and read permissions on the file. You might try:
chmod a+r /etc/vsftpd.user_list
if you think your daemon might not be reading the file

You could also turn the user list off to see if it may be the problem.

You could turn off the chroot list also to see if it is the problem. etc.


As always, good luck.