*BSD News Article 81408


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Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Path: euryale.cc.adfa.oz.au!newshost.carno.net.au!harbinger.cc.monash.edu.au!munnari.OZ.AU!news.mel.connect.com.au!nemeton.com.au!giles
From: giles@nemeton.com.au (Giles Lean)
Subject: Re: su in rc.local core
Organization: Nemeton Pty. Ltd.
Message-ID: <Dzr1FE.oC@nemeton.com.au>
References: <54lhnn$e9@kauss.rhein-main.de>
Date: Wed, 23 Oct 1996 22:06:50 GMT
Lines: 24

ska@kauss.rhein-main.de (Stephan Kauss) writes:

>I have the problem that I have to start up some programs at start time from
>the rc.local. The program has to run with the user permission.

I had a similar problem with NetBSD-1.1; this turned out to be a
coredump in setenv(3) which was called by su(1).  This could be
the same problem (but equally might not be :).

The bug was triggered when setenv was called for a variable that
was not set in the environment.

Workaround is to make sure that the relevant variables are all set;
for su that looks to be PATH, TERM, HOME, USER and SHELL.

Fix is to debug and repair setenv.  I have been travelling and haven't
had a chance to look at it yet.

Giles

-- 

Giles Lean             <giles@nemeton.com.au>           +61 3 9480 2118
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