SOLVED Bug: WHM 'Grant cPanel Support Access' requires legacy ifconfig

[Brian N]

Trying to use the WHM 'Grant cPanel Support Access' function, I was initially greeted with an error:
"A required program, ifconfig, is either not executable or does not exist."

The net-tools RPM provides ifconfig, but that RPM isn't part of a default AlmaLinux 8 install as it's considered somewhat legacy. And cPanel also doesn't add that RPM during its install.

Installing net-tools fixed the WHM function for me, but it should really be updated to remove the dependency on ifconfig. Or if not, then cPanel should add net-tools to its list of requisite RPMs.

edit: typo

 

[cPRex]

Hey there! I wasn't able to reproduce this issue on a 102.0.2 system running AlmaLinux 8 just now. I checked that server and found the following packages installed by default:

# rpm -qa | grep iptables
iptables-ebtables-1.8.4-20.el8.x86_64
iptables-1.8.4-20.el8.x86_64
iptables-libs-1.8.4-20.el8.x86_64

and I also see that net-tools is installed.

Is it possible these were excluded by your provider from the initial operating system image?

 

[Brian N]

I am my provider I used the AlmaLinux 8.5 minimal ISO as per cPanel installation guide. The net-tools rpm isn't included there but that doesn't matter as cPanel installs several additional needed rpms on its own during install anyways.

This was with cPanel 94 (LTS). I have not tried with newer versions so maybe the installer/dependencies were updated to install net-tools in that case. I'll probably be doing another install soon so maybe I'll check to see if it's different with newer cPanel.

Not sure how iptables got in the mix. We're only talking about ifconfig.

 

[cPRex]

Ah, iptables, ifconfig, it all kinda looked the same to me yesterday, apparently!

I tried with version 102, 94, and a plain Alma install and couldn't reproduce this on my end. Can you let me know the ISO you were using?

 

[Brian N]

This iso: AlmaLinux-8.5-x86_64-minimal.iso

I tired again today with a fresh install of Alma and cPanel 94. Still see the issue.

 

[cPRex]

Thanks for that - I'm doing some additional testing on my end and I'll let you know what I find.

 

[cPRex]

Here's what I did for my testing:

-pulled the ISO directly from Index of /almalinux/8/isos/x86_64/
-installed that on a server
-confirmed that net-tools was not installed at that point
-installed cPanel version 100
-confirmed the net-tools package was installed after that

I then repeated the above process with version 94 LTS on the same ISO, and cPanel also installed net-tools in that environment.

At this point I'm not able to reproduce with any of the operating systems I have. If you can get us access to your system before cPanel is installed we'd be happy to do some more testing there.

 

[Brian N]

Ugh. In a classic case of "that should have nothing to do with this issue..." So much work for such a minor issue :/

I inadvertently failed to mention one more difference. I'm installing cPanel with MariaDB 10.3 as detailed here. Note: 10.3 is the only option available for Alma 8 + cPanel 94.

I just confirmed that a 'default' install using MySQL 8 does indeed result with net-tools being installed. But installing instead with MariaDB does not. Of course, IMO the net-tools dependency should be part of cPanel 'core' and have nothing to do with the database selected...

edit: cPanel 94

 

[cPRex]

Oh that's interesting. Let me check on that!

 

[Brian N]

I confirmed that net-tools is a dependency for mysql-community-server-8.0.28-1.el8, hence why it gets pulled in with the default install but not when using MariaDB instead.

 

[cPRex]

Alright, I've got case CPANEL-40067 open with the developers now so they can look into this. It sounds like the plan will be to include net-tools as part of the main install, and not rely on another package dependency for those tools.

 

[cPRex]

Update - this will be fixed in the next v94 release when it goes live.