memory fault (coredump)

[CHRMC]

Hi, A Cobol program of mine fails with a memory fault every time when I trigger it from the command line with the "root" id. The same program runs just fine when I put it in root's crontab. And it runs fine when I trigger it with an ordinary user's id. Could anyone tell me why? Thanks in advance. -Nathan

[Cheryl Griffin]

With a memory fault (coredump) a core file should be left behind.

Execute the following:
# file core

It will provide you something like:
# file core
core: core file from 'hostname' - received SIGABRT

this may give you some clues.

[Cheryl Griffin]

In addition, look at what you have set in the user profile or cron script that may not be set when cobol is invoked as root.

You may have some needed environment variable that is being set except for root.

[Madhu Sudhan_1]

Problem could be with "ulimit". Compare ulimit output of root and any other user by firing ulimit -a and look for the difference.

Hope this helps.
...Madhu

[CHRIS_ANORUO]

Do a check on the core file with "strings coredump file|pg"
Also check with "file core" and do an online manual check on the meaning of the SIG i.e "man 5 signal"

[CHRMC]

Thank you all for your ideas. It runs through when I trimed off root's $PATH to /usr/bin/sh just for this program. -Nathan