I've recently switched distros to Mint Debian 12 64-bit XFCE. This is on an AMD Phenom *4, 4 GB of RAM. When I was reinstalling stuff I noticed that the latest version of Lazarus that they have in the repo is 0.9.28, a bit old I know, but it works for what I do.

So I installed 0.9.28, which also brought in FPC 2.4.0-2.

When I try to run Lazarus from the menus, I get the splash screen and then nothing, the IDE never comes up.

So, I switched to a terminal, ran startlazarus and got the following output.

[WARNING] Out of OEM specific VK codes, changing to unassigned [WARNING] Out of unassigned VK codes, assigning $FF TLazarusManager.Run starting /usr/lib/lazarus/0.9.28.2/lazarus ... Runtime error 203 at $0000000000736A16
$0000000000736A16
$0000000000720991

OK, maybe it's an old version. I downloaded the latest .DEBs from SourceForge, and installed those. No change in the symptoms (well, OK, I can't say the addresses were exactly the same, but the bit about the VK codes was, and it was still a runtime error 203).

I cleaned out everything to do with Lazarus and FPC that I could find (using KFind to make sure I got everything) and had one more try with 0.9.28. As expected, still the same error. I know that 0.9.28 used to run on Mint 9 64-bit, but that was the Ubuntu-based version, not the Debian-based one.

Anyone have any ideas how to fix this, please?

Brian.

Starting at a shell prompt, if you load Lazarus in gdb, run it, wait for the crash and then use GDB's bt command to get a backtrace, do the first few lines say anything useful?

Probably not, but this is what was produced using V0.9.28

<paste>

run
Starting program: /usr/bin/startlazarus
[Thread debugging using libthread_db enabled]

Program received signal SIGSEGV, Segmentation fault. 0x00000000005a2879 in ?? ()
(gdb) bt
#0 0x00000000005a2879 in ?? ()
#1 0x00007fffffffe1c0 in ?? ()
#2 0x00007ffff7de902c in ?? () from /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 #3 0x0000000000502b31 in ?? ()
#4 0x00007ffff577dead in __libc_start_main () from /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libc.so.6
#5 0x0000000000000000 in ?? ()
(gdb)

</paste>

Brian.

I use Debian rather than Ubuntu, don't have x64, and generally build both FPC and Lazarus from source.

Put another way, I hope there's somebody active in the the list who's rather more au fait with your actual configuration than I am

There was a problem with ubuntu 12 and gtk (glib2-2.31). A patch was created and committed http://bugs.freepascal.org/view.php?id=21129 . If mint 12 is derived from ubuntu 12 you'll probably running into this problem. Try lazarus from svn.

Ludo

That patch is backported to 0.9.30.4 too.

zeljko
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Have you tried 0.9.30.4 or 0.9.31?

Mattias

Yes, there seems to be a basic specific conflict between Linux Mint Debian Edition (LMDE) x64 and Lazarus.

WinFF a popular application written in Lazarus is experiencing the same issue: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=141&t=64629 I am willing to try to debug this but I need some pointers. How do I debug the start of Lazarus? -------------- next part --------------
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Yes. I downloaded the latest .DEBs from SourceForge, 0.9.30.4. The symptoms were unchanged.

Brian.

This is the Debian-based version of Mint. Standard Mint is Ubuntu-based but the Debian version is for those who prefer a rolling distribution. AFAIK, the current build is based on Debian Wheezy.

I've tried downloading the svn version, and there's some problem with libgdb.a, I can't even get FPC to build, let alone Lazarus. There are YARDS of undefined globals. I finally got an answer from someone on the FPC list (after just being told "fix your GDB") and I'm trying to work my way through that at the moment.

Brian.

Granted that not all messages get through our gateway, but is that the thread from October last year? I only ask because your recounting of that advice does sound somewhat... brutal.

I fairly regularly build both FPC trunk and the current release on multiple platforms (but markedly /not/ on x86-64) and in many cases drop libgdb from FPC since it's only required for the fp IDE. Looking at your list of undefineds, I think the right question would have been "how can I build a vanilla libgdb that doesn't require a whole lot of Python libraries etc."- and I'm afraid that's one for the gdb developers rather than us.

Yes. I'm certain that the first answer I got said precisely and ONLY that, but I can't find it in the folder now I look back. Either I'm going ga-ga or it was a private reply or I just nuked it in disgust. If that's all you have to say, why bother posting? I can't even remember the name of the responder now. Apologies to you as you did try to help - but it's not until I looked back and saw Pierre's message that I've made any progress.

So you're telling me that *any* program which I need to build myself and which pulls in libgdb is going to have all those undefineds? That does sound to be a bit of a shortcoming if so! I did try installing a bunch of Python libraries as well, but didn't get anywhere.

Anyway, I shall keep bashing away at trying to get the svn versions to build and install, and see whether they cure the latest problem. It will take me a little while to get it done, but I'll report back if I manage to fix it - I'm not too keen on the alternative, which is trying to resurrect my Fortran from umpty-mumble years ago.

Brian.

I'm not going back to the October stuff right now, this could well be a distro issue particularly if it's got a libgdb package but not the underlying Python libraries. I'm afraid I've never been into Python: my style's more Horne :-)

I'd suggest getting a working FPC 2.6.0, either as a binary (from the FPC servers) or building it yourself although this might require that you start with 2.4.4. In the latter case use something like

$ make NOGDB=1 OPT='-gl' all

followed by a make install , after which you'll probably want to make sure that you've got /usr/local/bin/ppc386 ->
/usr/local/lib/fpc/2.6.0/ppc386 or similar (make install doesn't mess with that symlink: I'm not sure that's a wise omission but it's the way it is).

The NOGDB will make sure that there is no reference to libgdb, but as I said earlier it is only required by the fp text-mode IDE.

Having to that point, get a recent Lazarus. Now I'm sure you've got your own preferences, but the one that I've built most recently was the fixes RC from SVN

svn co
http://svn.freepascal.org/svn/lazarus/branches/branches/release_0_9_30_4 ./lazarus-fixed

If you decide that you really do need libgdb, which you DO NOT if your interest is Lazarus, then I suggest finding or building a copy around v6.7.1 and then using make GDB_V607=1 OPT='... since this definitely works on Debian (Etch/Lenny/Squeeze) x86 and others. HTH.

Hi Mark,

I tried rebuilding gdb and libgdb.a from source, making sure I had all the Python libraries installed. That seemed to work OK, no errors. I installed everything and tried rebuilding FPC with no switches. There were less undefined globals, but still a lot of them.

So then I followed your instructions.

1) Yes, FPC from svn will build correctly with the NOGDB switch you provided. I did so, and installed it.

2) I downloaded the Lazarus that you indicate above. It built without errors, but when I try to run it, it still comes up with the error
203. Running under the debugger produces this output

<paste>

Runtime error 203 at $00000000006EFFDA
$00000000006EFFDA
$00000000006D90ED

[Inferior 1 (process 4558) exited with code 0313]

</paste>

I've taken a look on the Linux Mint forums, and I certainly don't seem to be the only one seeing this problem, as David's posting also suggested.

I have two friends who are total non-programmers. Neither FPC nor Lazarus will have been anywhere near their machines. One of them is running Debian Testing, on which Linux Mint Debian (LMDE) is built, the other is running LMDE as I am. Both are on 64-bit distros.

I'm going to ask them both to try installing Lazarus and then try to run it. If, as I suspect, the LMDE user sees the crash and the plain Debian user doesn't, then I think that will be fairly conclusive.

In the short term, I guess the best way out will be to set up a virtual machine with a copy of some other distro and do any Lazarus work in that.

I'm still a relative novice at Linux, though I've long experience with Borland/CodeGear/Embarcadero Pascal/Delphi under Windows. If any of the developers want me to try compilations etc. under LMDE, I'd be happy to devote up to a couple of hours a day in doing so, but I'd need to be led through most of it.

Thanks for your help, and I'll report back when I hear from my friends, although I will be very surprised if they do anything other than confirm what I've found, i.e. Lazarus will run just fine on plain Debian but not on LMDE.

Brian.

Thanks Brian, I for one am watching with interest.

For anyone still interested in this thread, sorry it's taking me so long to post again but I'm on a satellite internet connection, I only have unrestricted downloads between 0200 and 0700, and so it takes me quite a while to set up virtual machines and do the updates.

While I've had one reply from a posting to the Mint Debian forums from someone who is tracking the unstable repositories and is able to run Lazarus without a problem, there seems to be no doubt that there is a basic incompatibility between Lazarus and either the stable or testing distros of Mint Debian. I haven't been able to get Lazarus to start on either distro, whether 32 bit or 64 bit, but plain Debian stable or testing runs Lazarus just fine.

I'm going to try pointing at the unstable repositories now, and I'll post again in 3-4 days when I've had time to do the final set of updates and try all the different permutations.

For the moment, I strongly advise anyone who wants to run Lazarus *NOT* to install Linux Mint Debian. If you want a rolling distro, stick with plain Debian rather than the Mint version, or try one of the others.

All of the above does NOT apply to the Ubuntu-based versions of Mint. They run Lazarus without problems, too.

Brian.

Well, I've done a bunch of testing with some virtual machines, plus a bunch of web searches looking for other threads on this error, and it seems to be plain that it's a multi-way incompatibility. If you are running Linux Mint Debian Edition (LMDE) V12 on an AMD 64-bit CPU (and it doesn't matter whether you run a 32 or 64 bit version of the operating system) then Lazarus will crash, reproducibly, and that holds for any version of LAzarus between 0.9.28.2 up to a fairly recent svn version.

If you're running on an Intel CPU, or a 32-bit AMD chip, or you're running the Ubuntu-based version of Mint, you won't have a problem.

This is particularly puzzling since LMDE is built on Debian testing, and Debian testing will run Lazarus without a problem. For that reason, it seems to me that it's a problem for the LMDE folks rather than the Lazarus developers.

Now, where did I put that Debian installation DVD?

Brian.

I installed Linux Mint Debian Edition 64bit in virtualbox. And Lazarus 0.9.31 does not crash here.

Mattias

And you're running on an AMD CPU?

In that case, I'm absolutely baffled, because I've done nothing more than install LMDE, get any upgrades, and try to install and run Lazarus. Which version did you try installing first, the one from the LMDE repos? If it's possible that you need to install the latest version and no other, then that might explain it.

If you can confirm that you're running an AMD-based system, then please let me know what version of Lazarus you used, and I will set up another VM and try again.

Thanks,

Brian.

Mattias Gaertner wrote

I installed Linux Mint Debian Edition 64bit in virtualbox. And Lazarus 0.9.31 does not crash here.

Sorry, I missed the version number. Please just confirm for me that you're running on an AMD CPU and I'll try another VM.

Brian.

Yes.
AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 965 Processor

I downloaded the ISO,
then did an upgrade,
then installed the package "lazarus" and subversion to get the development packages,
then uninstalled lazarus, keeping the rest,
then installed fpc 2.6.0 from zip,
then downloaded fpc svn trunk, compiled, installed then downloaded lazarus svn trunk, compiled, started then \O/

If you can confirm that you're running an AMD-based system, then please let me know what version of Lazarus you used, and I will set up another VM and try again.

Mattias

Thanks. I will follow exactly those steps. Watch this space...

Brian.

And you're running on an AMD CPU? In that case, I'm absolutely baffled

You shouldn't, I have reported it working on AMD in the mantis case (http://bugs.freepascal.org/view.php?id=21515) and on the lazarus forum (http://forum.lazarus.freepascal.org/index.php/topic,14881.msg89591.html#msg 89591).

Ludo

Thank you for the attempts to help, Matthias, but having followed your procedures above, I still get an error 203 when trying to run lazarus from the build directory. If I try to run startlazarus, then I get nothing unless I run under GDB, when I get the error 203.

To be frank, I've had a bellyfull of this. I'm going to cut my losses and reinstall plain old Debian. That ran Lazarus without the slightest problems.

Brian.

Well I followed Mattias's procedure, which worked for him, and all I can say is that it still doesn't work for me. I regret ever having thought of the idea of reverting to Mint - or, at least, trying LMDE. Since I was using Debian testing anyway, I thought I had little to lose and something to gain.

I'm going to give up on Mint and reinstall plain old Debian. I know Lazarus works on that **on my PC**.

Brian.

The bottom line to all this, as probably no-one will be surprised to learn, is that wiping Mint Debian and re-installing standard Debian means that Lazarus works just fine for me once again.

I understand that Mattias and Ludo both managed to run Lazarus on LMDE without a problem. I'm perfectly willing to accept that there's some complex interaction which affects only a few PCs running LMDE.

I guess that whether or not you install LMDE if you want to use Lazarus depends on how lucky you feel. Certainly anyone doing so should be prepared to have to revert to another distro if they get unlucky.

Brian.