#127 logwatch cron uses erroneous path in newer EL versions.

[Reio Remma]

0logwatch cron script seems to point to /usr/sbin/logwatch however in newer EL versions sbindir in RPM spec files points to /usr/bin and logwatch executable is installed there.

This has resulted in a broken daily script on AlmaLinux 9.7

/etc/cron.daily/0logwatch:
LOGWATCH_SCRIPT="/usr/sbin/logwatch"

Actual path:
/usr/bin/logwatch

[Reio Remma]

So maybe sed the path in 0logwatch replacing the path with sbindir variable during build.

Just manually ran sed to get things working again:

sed -i 's/LOGWATCH_SCRIPT="\/usr\/sbin\/logwatch"/LOGWATCH_SCRIPT="\/usr\/bin\/logwatch"/' /etc/cron.daily/0logwatch

[Mike Tremaine]

If RHEL 9.x+ and children have changed the path of the logwatch script in the rpm spec (which is normally a symlink in any case) from sbin to bin, then whatever solution also needs handle all instances of the path….

A simple grep shows we have 4 files which have the hardcoded /usr/sbin/logwatch

README:ln -s /usr/share/logwatch/scripts/logwatch.pl /usr/sbin/logwatch
install_logwatch.sh:ln -f -s $BASEDIR/scripts/logwatch.pl /usr/sbin/logwatch
install_logwatch.sh:printf "Created symlink for /usr/sbin/logwatch \n"
scheduler/logwatch.service:ExecStart=/usr/sbin/logwatch $LOGWATCH_OPTIONS
scheduler/logwatch.cron:LOGWATCH_SCRIPT="/usr/sbin/logwatch”

-Mike

On Apr 23, 2026, at 12:33 AM, Reio Remma whataboutpereir@users.sourceforge.net wrote:

So maybe sed the path in 0logwatch replacing the path with sbindir variable during build.

Just manually ran sed to get things working again:

sed -i 's/LOGWATCH_SCRIPT="\/usr\/sbin\/logwatch"/LOGWATCH_SCRIPT="\/usr\/bin\/logwatch"/' /etc/cron.daily/0logwatch

[bugs:#127] https://sourceforge.net/p/logwatch/bugs/127/ logwatch cron uses erroneous path in newer EL versions.

Status: open
Group: v7.14
Created: Thu Apr 23, 2026 07:19 AM UTC by Reio Remma
Last Updated: Thu Apr 23, 2026 07:19 AM UTC
Owner: nobody

0logwatch cron script seems to point to /usr/sbin/logwatch however in newer EL versions sbindir in RPM spec files points to /usr/bin and logwatch executable is installed there.

This has resulted in a broken daily script on AlmaLinux 9.7

/etc/cron.daily/0logwatch:
LOGWATCH_SCRIPT="/usr/sbin/logwatch"

Actual path:
/usr/bin/logwatch

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[Scott D-S]

I believe this is related/similar so replying here vs. creating a new bug.

First install of v7.14 on a (new) RockyLinux 9.7 VM yesterday and received this error overnight:
/etc/cron.daily/0logwatch: line 14: /usr/sbin/logwatch: No such file or directory

Confirmed the file was missing:

ls -lrt /usr/sbin/logwatch
ls: cannot access '/usr/sbin/logwatch': No such file or directory

On other RL8/RL9 installs using prior versions (both v7.9 and v7.13), this appears to be a link:

ls -lrt /usr/sbin/logwatch
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 root root 39 Jul 21  2025 /usr/sbin/logwatch -> /usr/share/logwatch/scripts/logwatch.pl

Confirmed the file still exists where expected:

ls -lrt /usr/share/logwatch/scripts/logwatch.pl
-rwxr-xr-x. 1 root root 63666 Jan 21 18:00 /usr/share/logwatch/scripts/logwatch.pl

So I created the link:

ln -s /usr/share/logwatch/scripts/logwatch.pl /usr/sbin/logwatch
ls -lrt /usr/sbin/logwatch
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 root root 39 May 28 08:49 /usr/sbin/logwatch -> /usr/share/logwatch/scripts/logwatch.pl

Waiting to see what happens overnight tonight...

[Bjorn]

There appears to be a push among some distributions/packages to move to /usr/bin, and eventually remove /usr/sbin.

So my inclination would be to change all references and installation of logwatch to /usr/bin. In both the logwatch.spec and install_logwatch.sh file, we can test if the /usr/sbin directory exists. If so, then add a symbolic link from /usr/sbin/logwatch to /usr/bin/logwatch, for those that have hard-coded the path in their own scripts.

That's not the end of the story, however. Some of the service scripts look for hard-coded paths that may include /usr/sbin, /sbin, and /usr/local/sbin (for other, non-logwatch executables). If those executable paths change (which can be distribution-specific), then we might need to make further changes.

[Bjorn]

Pushed change to /usr/bin rather than /usr/sbin as executable for logwatch (which is a symbolic link to the /usr/share/logwatch/scripts/logwatch.pl script).
Does not delete any links under /usr/sbin/logwatch. For existing systems, the old link continues to work. For new installations, only the new /usr/bin/logwatch link will work.
Also deleted the requirement for crontabs package, as newer installations may use alternate scheduling tools (most notably systemd timers).