Does '/var/log/faillog' exist and is it properly writable? Is SELinux in play, etc? The man page does not speak in terms of edits to: /etc/pam.d/system-auth but rather to: /etc/pam.d/login [note -- I suspect there may be a man page bug here ... in testing; changes to /etc/pam.d/login and some intentionally failed logins, do not seem to cause content to be added to /var/log/faillog . Making the edit to: /etc/pam.d/system-auth-ac DOES cause content to be registered, and to show up with the 'faillog -a' command [*1] ].
/etc/pam.d/system-auth is a symlink to: /etc/pam.d/system-auth-ac on my C 5 box, and editting here seems to work just fine:
[root@centos-5 pam.d]# diff -u system-auth-ac~ system-auth-ac --- system-auth-ac~ 2010-04-20 15:46:34.000000000 -0400 +++ system-auth-ac 2010-04-20 15:46:34.000000000 -0400 @@ -2,6 +2,7 @@ # This file is auto-generated. # User changes will be destroyed the next time authconfig is run. auth required pam_env.so +auth required pam_tally.so deny=3 unlock_time=600 per_user auth sufficient pam_unix.so nullok try_first_pass auth requisite pam_succeed_if.so uid >= 500 quiet auth required pam_deny.so [root@centos-5 pam.d]#
Nota bene: Note that the GUI tools will happily 'tromp' on changes you make, and do not retain backups.
Did you edit /etc/pam.d/login / /etc/pam.d/system-auth-ac per: man pam_tally at the bottom of that man page, and man 8 faillog
Not enough here to diagnose properly presently.
thanks both
pebkac it appears - faillog -a was producing the expected results, what seems to be the issue is that although the syntax was correct the location within auth-config was wrong and therefore being ignored.
your diff gave me the clue and seemingly resolved my issue - many thanks