Linux newbie mistake - please help

[droeun]

Hello,

This is my first time working with Linux - hopefully somebody can help me out. When the box was originally installed I had a local user account named Cacti created. I changed my mind later & deleted/changed it via GNOME desktop. Cacti has been working perfectly fine up until 1:45pm yesterday. I checked the logs & noticed things stopped working around the same time I issued a userdel -r cacti to clean up any residual user files - but what a mistake! I tried adding the user back in but that didn't seem to do anything. I think it's something with cron & poller - is it somehow tied to the local account? I don't have the knowledge or experience necessary even to begin looking where to fix this issue - any help would be greatly appreciated.

[root@Cacti log]# userdel -r cacti
userdel: /usr/share/cacti not owned by cacti, not removing

Secure log:

May 28 13:49:00 localhost userdel[19848]: delete user `cacti'
May 28 13:49:00 localhost userdel[19848]: removed group `cacti' owned by `cacti'
May 28 13:50:01 localhost crond[19855]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 13:50:01 localhost crond[19855]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 13:55:01 localhost crond[19868]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 13:55:01 localhost crond[19868]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:00:01 localhost crond[19906]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:00:01 localhost crond[19906]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:05:01 localhost crond[19943]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:05:01 localhost crond[19943]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:10:01 localhost crond[19945]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:10:01 localhost crond[19945]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:15:01 localhost crond[19947]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:15:01 localhost crond[19947]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:20:01 localhost crond[19949]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:20:01 localhost crond[19949]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:25:01 localhost crond[19951]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:25:01 localhost crond[19951]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:30:01 localhost crond[19953]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:30:01 localhost crond[19953]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:35:01 localhost crond[19955]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:35:01 localhost crond[19955]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:40:01 localhost crond[19957]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:40:01 localhost crond[19957]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti
May 28 14:45:01 localhost crond[20012]: pam_unix(crond:account): could not identify user (from getpwnam(cacti))
May 28 14:45:01 localhost crond[20012]: pam_succeed_if(crond:account): error retrieving information about user cacti

Cron:

ay 28 13:40:01 localhost CROND[19795]: (cacti) CMD (/usr/bin/php /usr/share/cacti/poller.php > /dev/null 2>&1)
May 28 13:45:01 localhost CROND[19822]: (cacti) CMD (/usr/bin/php /usr/share/cacti/poller.php > /dev/null 2>&1)
May 28 13:50:01 localhost crond[19855]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 13:55:01 localhost crond[19868]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:00:01 localhost crond[19906]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:01:01 localhost CROND[19919]: (root) CMD (run-parts /etc/cron.hourly)
May 28 14:05:01 localhost crond[19943]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:10:01 localhost crond[19945]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:15:01 localhost crond[19947]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:20:01 localhost crond[19949]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:25:01 localhost crond[19951]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:30:01 localhost crond[19953]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:35:01 localhost crond[19955]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:40:01 localhost crond[19957]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:45:01 localhost crond[20012]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)
May 28 14:50:01 localhost crond[20971]: (cacti) FAILED to authorize user with PAM (User not known to the underlying authentication m
odule)

[droeun]

Hellfahh!

I added cacti user back in /etc/passwd & /etc/group, but am still getting a failed to authorize user with PAM message. What other things might affect cacti when the user is removed? I'd hate to re-add all 65 devices back in after a fresh install

[droeun]

Probably not the best solution but I uninstalled & reinstalled Cacti. Everything was still there too.

Thanks!