FS#24648 - core dumps as a result of glib2 and gtk3

Attached to Project: Arch Linux
Opened by Liao Haohui (liaohaohui) - Thursday, 09 June 2011, 14:13 GMT
Last edited by Ionut Biru (wonder) - Tuesday, 30 August 2011, 12:35 GMT
Task Type Bug Report
Category Packages: Testing
Status Closed
Assigned To No-one
Architecture All
Severity High
Priority Normal
Reported Version
Due in Version Undecided
Due Date Undecided
Percent Complete 100%
Votes 0
Private No

Details

Description:

I did a full Arch Linux Testing update on 9 June 2011. I have encountered the crashing of Firefox 4.0.1, Midori-0.3.6-1, etc.
Midori will crash when I magnify it. Firefox will simply crash without a reason. I have checked on the Internet, it seems there are people encountering this problem.

But when Midori and Firefox both crashed, I suspect it is the problem of glib2 and gtk3.

The testing version of gtk3 is

gtk3-3.0.11-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.gz
glib2-2.28.8-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.gz

I have downgraded back to

gtk3-3.0.10-2-x86_64.pkg.tar.gz
glib2-2.28.5-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.gz

and the sudden core dump of midori and Firefox went away.

I am not sure about the testing/pacman as well since I encountered crashing of

pacman-3.5.3-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.gz

when the network connection is not available and when network connection stalls.

I am force to downgrade to

pacman-3.5.2-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.gz
This task depends upon

Closed by  Ionut Biru (wonder)
Tuesday, 30 August 2011, 12:35 GMT
Reason for closing:  Works for me
Comment by Ionut Biru (wonder) - Thursday, 09 June 2011, 14:22 GMT
maybe you are experiencing crashes because of glibc. i cannot really know because you didn't pasted any crash log.

glibc 2.14  FS#24615 

ps. firefox/midori are gtk2 apps and downgrading gtk3 doesn't have any effect on them
Comment by Liao Haohui (liaohaohui) - Friday, 10 June 2011, 03:30 GMT
The funny experience I have is the opposite: Downgrading gtk3 DID help, at least the crashes went away. I suspect it may have something to do with gconf (which depends on gtk3. I tried to remove gtk3 but gconf depends on it and so does file-roller, which is something I enjoy using).

Noop. I didn't downgrade my glibc, I only downgraded my gtk3 and glib2 and the crashing problem went away. Anyway, this is my experience, may not be true for others.

Steps that I can reproduce the scenario is as follows:

(1) I am running FVWM-devel 2.7, I performed a vertical magnification on Midori, Midori crashed! Voila. I tried multiple times, and a core dump was produce, not sure how to debug it or produce a log for it. But I downgraded my glib2 and gtk3, problem went away. So I do have a foundation to suspect it's a gtk3 or glib2 problem.

(2) As for Firefox, it just randomly crashed in 1 or 2 minutes with a core dump produce, not sure how to reproduce at all. So, I can't produce a log either, maybe because I move the Firefox around on FVWM?

(3) Gconf (which depends on GTK3) may be the culprit since after upgrading file-roller that depends on GNOME3, file-roller simply crashes. While the file-roller that depends only on GTK2 works fine.
Comment by Liao Haohui (liaohaohui) - Friday, 10 June 2011, 05:25 GMT
Dear Ionut Biru,

You observation is right. I downgraded glib2 and gtk3 and then firefox and midori seems no to crash for 1 minute and I thought the cause is from glib2 and gtk3. I ran firefox this morning and firefox crashed again. Now that I have downgrading to glibc-2.13-5, firefox runs OK!!! So the crashes of pacman-3.5.3-1, firefox, midori that I observed are all cause by glibc.
Comment by Ionut Biru (wonder) - Friday, 10 June 2011, 06:26 GMT
can i get a trace? run firefox in gdb and make it crash and then bt full.

gdb firefox
bt full
Comment by Jelle van der Waa (jelly) - Sunday, 21 August 2011, 12:12 GMT
Any update would be nice from the reporter
Comment by Liao Haohui (liaohaohui) - Tuesday, 30 August 2011, 12:23 GMT
Dear Ionut Biru and jelle van der waa,

I am extremely sorry. I forgot to close this tread. The report is caused by the new release of glibc 2.14 which changes the RPC implementation. Apparently Firefox and Midori uses RPC which cause them to crash.

I am not too sure why downgrading glib2 and gtk3 at the time temporarily allow Firefox not to crash. This sounds strange to me. The time when I filed the report, Firefox is still version 4 and now Firefox is already version 6. So this thread can officially retired.

However, I believe this thread can be useful as a record to remind us that low level (kernel or glibc) problems can cause applications to coredump and non-expert such as me may attribute to the problem with gtk2, gtk3 or glib. I am hoping that my remark here will allow experts to write up a simple procedure for Arch users like me to be able to perform a better tracing next time.

@Ionut Biru,

Thanks for the gdb firefox suggestion. I will follow your suggestion to file in a detail bug reporting next time.

Thanks for all your efforts!

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