Problems with XFS patch and SMP

[Bob Hilliard <hilliard@debian.org>]

     I wrote:

>      Bug#171943 reports that dictd 1.8.0 fails to start with the
> following error message:
> 
> daemon@amalthea:~$ /usr/sbin/dictd -d nofork
> :I: 2535 starting dictd 1.8.0/rf on Linux 2.4.19-xfs Tue Dec  3 23:43:09 2002
> dictd (dict_index_open): Cannot mmap index file "/dev/null(dict_index_open) Cannot mmap index file "/dev/nulldict_index_open: No such device
> (dict_index_open) dict_index_open: No such device
> 
>      I have not experienced any problems with this version in woody,
> sarge or sid, using a 2.4.18 kernel, and I have not received any other
> similar bug reports.
> 
>      The reporter is running a 2.4.19 kernel with the XFS patch and
> SMP support.  Are there any known issues with the XFS patch and SMP
> support that could contribute to this problem?
> 
>      Is anyone running dictd with a 2.4.19 kernel with the XFS patch and
> SMP support?

     Thanks to Craig Saunders, Russell Coker, and Bernd Eckenfels for
helpful comments.

     The problem turns out not to be related to XFS or SMP.  It was a
configuration error caused by the dictdconfig script.  All dictionaries
had been removed from the submitter's system, without his being aware
of it.  If dictdconfig doesn't find any installed dictionaries, it
creates a configuration item for a dummy dictionary in /dev/null.
This was a misguided attempt to prevent dictd from failing to start if
no dictionaries are installed.  This will be fixed.

     Especial thanks to Craig for installing dictd on a machine with a
2.4.19 kernel with XFS and SMP for testing.  This can be removed
whenever you like.

Regards,

Bob
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