I used Automate::pdm::ubuntu-10-04 to install postfix, dovecot, and mysql. Dovecot and MySQL appear to be working, but Postfix is not. When I check /var/log/mail.log after restarting postfix, I get "fatal: bind: 127.0.0.1 25: Address already in use". I recently removed citadel and sendmail, but when I run "lsof -i :25", I get:

COMMAND PID USER FD TYPE DEVICE SIZE/OFF NODE NAME
sendmail- 5723 root 4u IPv4 3214953 0t0 TCP localhost.localdomain:smtp

When I try to test the setup with mailx, in the mail log, I see:

liberty postfix/postdrop[20478]: warning: unable to look up public/pickup: No such file or directory

I tried to remove sendmail, but both "apt-get" and "dpkg" say it's already gone. Yet, the lsof message stays the same. Is it possible that some other application is simply using the name "sendmail" as an alias? How would I figure that out? That's where I am stuck. I see all the obvious clues, but none of the obvious solutions seem to work.

Try rebooting your linode.

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Thanks! That fixed postfix!

My overall setup still isn't working, but I need to dig around some more to see what's actually going on.

By the way, as my name implies, I am a linux noob. Is rebooting typically necessary when installing new packages, applications, etc.? Windows always forces you to do so when necessary, so I guess I have gotten used to that.

Strictly speaking, rebooting isn't necessary for anything but booting a different kernel. It should also be done at least once after you're done making a change to the stuff that happens on boot (like, say, installing/configuring/testing web server or mail server software), just to make sure everything Does The Right Thing (tm) on boot. However, as you've found, it's also a nice quick way to stop whatever is still listening on port 25 (as well as everything else!) when you forget to stop a program before uninstalling it.

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Generally I wouldn't have suggested rebooting but I've seen this problem before and a reboot is the simplest solution. Something to do with switching from sendmail to postfix leaves a sendmail process running.

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So... what's so hard with 'killall sendmail'?

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Nothing... however, 'reboot' is faster to type than 'killall sendmail && sleep 3 (or so) && service postfix start', and just as effective.

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