We have recently (over the last few days) had several people report problems with avast.  I am in the process of further investigating this morning and see if I can repeat any issues / find out more.

In your case your debug output seems indicate a permission issue on one or more of the avast files - likely the 400.vps virus database file, and possibly the log file . 

Certainly avast updates occasionally seem to get itself slightly tangled and reinstalling it does generally resolve it. 

Marijn 

 

On Tuesday 01/04/2014 at 8:20 am, surgemailHIDDEN@etwinsite.com wrote:

I have an issue with Avast I was running Avast without issues, as long as the set the
"sysctl -w kernel.shmmax=128000000"

Over the weekend I get an E-mail

"vpipe failures 25 in a row av_avast , See http://netwinsite.com/surgemail/help/avast.htm#vpipe"

which I am familiar with, but this time I can't get it going.

I also noticed my (Ubuntu server) is now at 14.04 I'm not sure if this is the culprit, but this time I can't get it to start, no matter what I do, I even tried to reinstall the avast portion it install i can runt the

/av_avast -update
I get


avastvpsreload: `/var/lib/avast4/400.vps' file is not writeable

and

if I try

/av_avast -test

This test will:
- dynamically load avast libraries (checking dependencies)
- attempt to scan an infected message
- attempt to scan a clean message...
Loading avast libraries

is virus database installed? (try running 'av_avast -update')... Aborting now


if I reboot the server and run

/av_avast -update

I get..


tcp: open (files.avast.com) binding to ()
tcp: Downloading If-Modified-Since: Tue, 01 Apr 2014 17:29:40 GMT
tcp: Not downloading. (/var/tmp/400vps.md5) has not changed since it was last downloaded.
tcp: Downloading (/var/tmp/400.vps) from (http://files.avast.com/files/latest/400.vps) via (), timeout 120 seconds
tcp: Open connection to (files.avast.com) and fetch (/files/latest/400.vps) 1.0
tcp: open (files.avast.com) binding to ()
tcp: Downloading If-Modified-Since: Tue, 01 Apr 2014 17:28:14 GMT
tcp: Downloaded 114058386/114058386 bytes /var/tmp/400.vps
new style update command syntax used
new style update command syntax used
virus database getting reloaded by running /usr/bin/avastvpsreload -d /var/tmp -l /var/lib/avast4 -a
lib_spawn: lib_spawn_detach(/usr/bin/avastvpsreload -d /var/tmp -l /var/lib/avast4 -a)
avastvpsreload: `/var/lib/avast4/400.vps' file is not writeable
Spawned program returned 4
Exit of condition of avastvpsreload is=4
Could not store status (SUCCESS) in avast/lastupdate.dat - Permission denied
Update completed :-)
done, so exiting


yet running
/av_avast -test


./av_avast -test av_avast.log: Permission denied
Switching av_avast to be running as same user as surgemail uid=8 gid=8
creating default av_avast.ini file as it does not exist
AV_AVAST STARTED
running "selftest"
This test will:
- dynamically load avast libraries (checking dependencies)
- attempt to scan an infected message
- attempt to scan a clean message...
This test will dynamically load avast libraries and attempt to scan an infected message and clean message...
Loading avast libraries
Loading libavastengine.so
library opened
lib: Avast dynamically loaded
avast! library loaded (libavastengine.so)
avworkInitialize returned 22
ERR: avworkInitialize returned 22! Aborting now.
Avast initialisation failed, avworkInitialize returned 22
is virus database installed? (try running 'av_avast -update')... Aborting now


Any Ideas I'm logged in with root.
Should I uninstall then reinstall? when I reinstalled I just installed on top of, since I don't' know the uninstall commands.