# bro segfaults on startup

**URL:** <https://community.zeek.org/t/bro-segfaults-on-startup/910>\
**Category:** Zeek\
**Created:** [January 9, 2006, 4:50pm UTC](https://community.zeek.org/t/bro-segfaults-on-startup/910 "2006-01-09T16:50:27Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![David\_Vasil1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6a8cbe/32.png) [@David\_Vasil1](https://community.zeek.org/u/David_Vasil1)\
**Post date:** [January 9, 2006, 4:50pm UTC](https://community.zeek.org/t/bro-segfaults-on-startup/910/1 "2006-01-09T16:50:27Z")

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Hello, I have an x86\_64 RHEL4u2 running a 2.6.14.2 kernel on which I compiled bro-1.0 with the following options:

./configure --prefix=/opt/bro

And did a make install and make install-brolite to create a base configuration. After that I attempt to run /opt/bro/etc/bro.rc -start which results in the following:

[root@endace bro]# etc/bro.rc start  
bro.rc: Running as non-root user bro  
bro.rc: Starting /opt/bro/etc/bro.rc: line 229: 6635 Segmentation fault "${BRO}" ${cmd\_opts} 2\>\>"${info\_log}" \>\>"${info\_log}"  
.........bro.rc: Failed to start Bro  
.... FAILED  
[root@endace bro]# etc/bro.rc start  
bro.rc: Running as non-root user bro  
bro.rc: Starting /opt/bro/etc/bro.rc: line 229: 6721 Segmentation fault "${BRO}" ${cmd\_opts} 2\>\>"${info\_log}" \>\>"${info\_log}"  
.........bro.rc: Failed to start Bro  
.... FAILED

In dmesg the following is shown:  
bro[6635]: segfault at 00000000fffcf678 rip 0000000000561ef5 rsp 00000000fffcf650 error 4  
bro[6721]: segfault at 00000000ffaafa58 rip 0000000000561ef5 rsp 00000000ffaafa30 error 4

In /var/log/messages the following is shown:  
Jan 9 11:38:34 endace su(pam\_unix)[6598]: session opened for user bro by root(uid=0)  
Jan 9 11:38:35 endace kernel: bro[6635]: segfault at 00000000fffcf678 rip 0000000000561ef5 rsp 00000000fffcf650 error 4  
Jan 9 11:38:40 endace bro.rc: Bro has failed to start. Unknown error, no messages recieved on STDERR or STDOUT  
Jan 9 11:38:40 endace bro.rc: Bro process failed on first start attempt. No further restart attempts will be made.  
Jan 9 11:38:41 endace su(pam\_unix)[6598]: session closed for user bro  
Jan 9 11:41:16 endace su(pam\_unix)[6684]: session opened for user bro by root(uid=0)  
Jan 9 11:41:16 endace kernel: bro[6721]: segfault at 00000000ffaafa58 rip 0000000000561ef5 rsp 00000000ffaafa30 error 4  
Jan 9 11:41:21 endace bro.rc: Bro has failed to start. Unknown error, no messages recieved on STDERR or STDOUT  
Jan 9 11:41:21 endace bro.rc: Bro process failed on first start attempt. No further restart attempts will be made.  
Jan 9 11:41:22 endace su(pam\_unix)[6684]: session closed for user bro

Notice, info, and alarm logfiles are created in bro's logs directory, however, all of these files are empty. I also tried the bro-0.9a11 branch, and it behaved the exact same way. Am I missing something? Thanks!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![David\_Vasil1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6a8cbe/32.png) [@David\_Vasil1](https://community.zeek.org/u/David_Vasil1)\
**Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 1:58pm UTC](https://community.zeek.org/t/bro-segfaults-on-startup/910/2 "2006-01-10T13:58:00Z")

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Jean-Philippe Luiggi wrote:

> Hello,
> 
> Did you configure/check your "bro.cfg" (/opt/bro/etc/bro.cfg, i think) ?
> 
> Best regards.

Yes, I used brolite to configure bro.cfg and then went back to verify the configuration by hand. However, I am now trying to start bro by hand using the following command line option:

bin/bro -i eth0 scan

which produces the same problem.

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**Author:** ![Jean-Philippe\_Luigg2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/aeb1de/32.png) [@Jean-Philippe\_Luigg2](https://community.zeek.org/u/Jean-Philippe_Luigg2)\
**Post date:** [January 10, 2006, 2:19pm UTC](https://community.zeek.org/t/bro-segfaults-on-startup/910/3 "2006-01-10T14:19:54Z")

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Hello,

Did you check your "bro.cfg" (/opt/bro/etc/bro.cfg, i think) ?

Best regards.

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**Author:** ![system](https://canada1.discourse-cdn.com/flex011/uploads/zeek/original/1X/f09d732bc2cc7c7cc7e35db67cf4e1d5233ce7a7.png) [@system](https://community.zeek.org/u/system)\
**Post date:** [May 6, 2022, 3:37pm UTC](https://community.zeek.org/t/bro-segfaults-on-startup/910/4 "2022-05-06T15:37:46Z")

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Closed on May 6, 2022, 3:37pm UTC