what have i done wrong (or didn't do) that gdb is not working properly for me?
root#6be3d60ab7c6:/# cat minimal.c
int main()
{
int i = 1337;
return 0;
}
root#6be3d60ab7c6:/# gcc -g minimal.c -o minimal
root#6be3d60ab7c6:/# gdb minimal
GNU gdb (Ubuntu 7.7.1-0ubuntu5~14.04.2) 7.7.1
.
.
.
Reading symbols from minimal...done.
(gdb) break main
Breakpoint 1 at 0x4004f1: file minimal.c, line 3.
(gdb) run
Starting program: /minimal
warning: Error disabling address space randomization: Operation not permitted
During startup program exited normally.
(gdb)
(gdb) print i
No symbol "i" in current context.
If you're using Docker, you probably need the --security-opt seccomp=unconfined option (as well as enabling ptrace):
docker run --cap-add=SYS_PTRACE --security-opt seccomp=unconfined
For whatever reason, your user account doesn't have permission to disable the kernel's address space layout randomisation for this process. By default, gdb turns this off because it makes some sorts of debugging easier (in particular, it means the address of stack objects will be the same each time you run your program). Read more here.
You can work around this problem by disabling this feature of gdb with set disable-randomization off.
As for getting your user the permission needed to disable ASLR, it probably boils down to having write permission to /proc/sys/kernel/randomize_va_space. Read more here.
Building on wisbucky's answer (thank you!), here are the same settings for Docker compose:
security_opt:
- seccomp:unconfined
cap_add:
- SYS_PTRACE
The security option seccomp:unconfined fixed the address space randomization warnings.
The capability SYS_PTRACE didn't seem to have a noticeable effect even though the Docker documentation states that SYS_PTRACE is a capability that is "not granted by default". Perhaps I don't know what to look for.
Related
We're learning to use GDB in my Computer Architecture class. To do this we do most of our work by using SSH to connect to a raspberry pi. When running GDB on some code he gave us to debug though it ends with an error message on how it can't find raise.c
I've tried:
installing libc6, libc6-dbg (says they're already up-to-date)
apt-get source glibc (gives me: "You must put some 'source' URIs in your sources.list")
https://stackoverflow.com/a/48287761/12015458 (apt source returns same thing as the apt-get source above, the "find $PWD" command the user gave returns nothing)
I've tried looking for it manually where told it may be? (/lib/libc doesn't exist for me)
This is the code he gave us to try debugging on GDB:
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int x,y;
y=54389;
for (x=10; x>=0; x--)
y=y/x;
printf("%d\n",y);
}
However, whenever I run the code in GDB I get the following error:
Program received signal SIGFPE, Arithmetic exception.
__GI_raise (sig=8) at ../sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/raise.c:50
50 ../sysdeps/unix/sysv/linux/raise.c: No such file or directory.
I asked him about it and he didn't really have any ideas on how to fix it.
It does not really matter that the source for raise() is not found. It would only show you the line where the exception is finally raised, but not the place where the error is triggered.
Run the erroneous program again in GDB. And when the exception is raised, investigate the call stack and the stackframes with GBDs commands. This is the point in your task, so I won't give you more than this hint.
If you're clever you can see the error in the given source just by looking at it. ;-)
When GDB does not know any symbol, you need to compile with the option -g to get debugger support.
EDIT
Now on a Windows system this is my log (please excuse the colouring, I didn't found a language selector for pure text):
D:\tmp\StackOverflow\so_027 > type crash1.c
#include <stdio.h>
main()
{
int x,y;
y=54389;
for (x=10; x>=0; x--)
y=y/x;
printf("%d\n",y);
}
D:\tmp\StackOverflow\so_027 > gcc crash1.c -g -o crash1.out
crash1.c:2:1: warning: return type defaults to 'int' [-Wimplicit-int]
main()
^~~~
D:\tmp\StackOverflow\so_027 > dir
[...cut...]
04.09.2019 08:33 144 crash1.c
04.09.2019 08:40 54.716 crash1.out
D:\tmp\StackOverflow\so_027 > gdb crash1.out
GNU gdb (GDB) 8.1
[...cut...]
This GDB was configured as "x86_64-w64-mingw32".
[...cut...]
Reading symbols from crash1.out...done.
(gdb) run
Starting program: D:\tmp\StackOverflow\so_027\crash1.out
[New Thread 4520.0x28b8]
[New Thread 4520.0x33f0]
Thread 1 received signal SIGFPE, Arithmetic exception.
0x0000000000401571 in main () at crash1.c:7
7 y=y/x;
(gdb) backtrace
#0 0x0000000000401571 in main () at crash1.c:7
(gdb) help stack
Examining the stack.
The stack is made up of stack frames. Gdb assigns numbers to stack frames
counting from zero for the innermost (currently executing) frame.
At any time gdb identifies one frame as the "selected" frame.
Variable lookups are done with respect to the selected frame.
When the program being debugged stops, gdb selects the innermost frame.
The commands below can be used to select other frames by number or address.
List of commands:
backtrace -- Print backtrace of all stack frames
bt -- Print backtrace of all stack frames
down -- Select and print stack frame called by this one
frame -- Select and print a stack frame
return -- Make selected stack frame return to its caller
select-frame -- Select a stack frame without printing anything
up -- Select and print stack frame that called this one
Type "help" followed by command name for full documentation.
Type "apropos word" to search for commands related to "word".
Command name abbreviations are allowed if unambiguous.
(gdb) next
Thread 1 received signal SIGFPE, Arithmetic exception.
0x0000000000401571 in main () at crash1.c:7
7 y=y/x;
(gdb) next
[Inferior 1 (process 4520) exited with code 030000000224]
(gdb) next
The program is not being run.
(gdb) quit
D:\tmp\StackOverflow\so_027 >
Well, it marks directly the erroneous source line. That is different to your environment as you use a Raspi. However, it shows you some GDB commands to try.
Concerning your video:
It is clear that inside raise() you can't access x. That's why GDB moans about it.
If an exception is raised usually the program is about to quit. So there is no value in stepping forward.
Instead, as shown in my log, use GDB commands to investigate the stack frames. I think this is the issue you are about to learn.
BTW, do you know that you should be able to copy the screen content? This will make reading so much easier for us.
From a practical standpoint the other answer is correct, but if you do want the libc sources:
apt-get source is the right way to get the sources of libc, but yes, you do need to have source repositories configured in /etc/apt/sources.list.
If you're using Ubuntu, see the deb-src lines in https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Repositories/CommandLine
For debian, see https://wiki.debian.org/SourcesList#Example_sources.list
Then apt-get source should work. Remember to tell GDB where those sources are using the "directory" command.
I'm trying to attach a program with gdb but it returns:
Attaching to process 29139
Could not attach to process. If your uid matches the uid of the target
process, check the setting of /proc/sys/kernel/yama/ptrace_scope, or try
again as the root user. For more details, see /etc/sysctl.d/10-ptrace.conf
ptrace: Operation not permitted.
gdb-debugger returns "Failed to attach to process, please check privileges and try again."
strace returns "attach: ptrace(PTRACE_ATTACH, ...): Operation not permitted"
I changed "kernel.yama.ptrace_scope" 1 to 0 and /proc/sys/kernel/yama/ptrace_scope 1 to 0 and tried set environment LD_PRELOAD=./ptrace.so with this:
#include <stdio.h>
int ptrace(int i, int j, int k, int l) {
printf(" ptrace(%i, %i, %i, %i), returning -1\n", i, j, k, l);
return 0;
}
But it still returns the same error. How can I attach it to debuggers?
If you are using Docker, you will probably need these options:
docker run --cap-add=SYS_PTRACE --security-opt seccomp=unconfined
If you are using Podman, you will probably need its --cap-add option too:
podman run --cap-add=SYS_PTRACE
This is due to kernel hardening in Linux; you can disable this behavior by echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/yama/ptrace_scope or by modifying it in /etc/sysctl.d/10-ptrace.conf
See also this article about it in Fedora 22 (with links to the documentation) and this comment thread about Ubuntu and .
I would like to add that I needed --security-opt apparmor=unconfined along with the options that #wisbucky mentioned. This was on Ubuntu 18.04 (both Docker client and host). Therefore, the full invocation for enabling gdb debugging within a container is:
docker run --cap-add=SYS_PTRACE --security-opt seccomp=unconfined --security-opt apparmor=unconfined
Just want to emphasize a related answer. Let's say that you're root and you've done:
strace -p 700
and get:
strace: attach: ptrace(PTRACE_SEIZE, 700): Operation not permitted
Check:
grep TracerPid /proc/700/status
If you see something like TracerPid: 12, i.e. not 0, that's the PID of the program that is already using the ptrace system call. Both gdb and strace use it, and there can only be one active at a time.
Not really addressing the above use-case but I had this problem:
Problem: It happened that I started my program with sudo, so when launching gdb it was giving me ptrace: Operation not permitted.
Solution: sudo gdb ...
As most of us land here for Docker issues I'll add the Kubernetes answer as it might come in handy for someone...
You must add the SYS_PTRACE capability in your pod's security context
at spec.containers.securityContext:
securityContext:
capabilities:
add: [ "SYS_PTRACE" ]
There are 2 securityContext keys at 2 different places. If it tells you that the key is not recognized than you missplaced it. Try the other one.
You probably need to have a root user too as default. So in the other security context (spec.securityContext) add :
securityContext:
runAsUser: 0
runAsGroup: 0
fsGroup: 101
FYI : 0 is root. But the fsGroup value is unknown to me. For what I'm doing I don't care but you might.
Now you can do :
strace -s 100000 -e write=1 -e trace=write -p 16
You won't get the permission denied anymore !
BEWARE : This is the Pandora box. Having this in production it NOT recommended.
I was running my code with higher privileges to deal with Ethernet Raw Sockets by setting set capability command in Debian Distribution. I tried the above solution: echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/yama/ptrace_scope
or by modifying it in /etc/sysctl.d/10-ptrace.conf but that did not work for me.
Additionally, I also tried with set capabilities command for gdb in installed directory (usr/bin/gdb) and it works: /sbin/setcap CAP_SYS_PTRACE=+eip /usr/bin/gdb.
Be sure to run this command with root privileges.
Jesup's answer is correct; it is due to Linux kernel hardening. In my case, I am using Docker Community for Mac, and in order to do change the flag I must enter the LinuxKit shell using justin cormack's nsenter (ref: https://www.bretfisher.com/docker-for-mac-commands-for-getting-into-local-docker-vm/ ).
docker run -it --rm --privileged --pid=host justincormack/nsenter1
/ # cat /etc/issue
Welcome to LinuxKit
## .
## ## ## ==
## ## ## ## ## ===
/"""""""""""""""""\___/ ===
{ / ===-
\______ O __/
\ \ __/
\____\_______/
/ # cat /proc/sys/kernel/yama/ptrace_scope
1
/ # echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/yama/ptrace_scope
/ # exit
Maybe someone has attached this process with gdb.
ps -ef | grep gdb
can't gdb attach the same process twice.
I was going to answer this old question as it is unaccepted and any other answers are not got the point. The real answer may be already written in /etc/sysctl.d/10-ptrace.conf as it is my case under Ubuntu. This file says:
For applications launching crash handlers that need PTRACE, exceptions can
be registered by the debugee by declaring in the segfault handler
specifically which process will be using PTRACE on the debugee:
prctl(PR_SET_PTRACER, debugger_pid, 0, 0, 0);
So just do the same thing as above: keep /proc/sys/kernel/yama/ptrace_scope as 1 and add prctl(PR_SET_PTRACER, debugger_pid, 0, 0, 0); in the debugee. Then the debugee will allow debugger to debug it. This works without sudo and without reboot.
Usually, debugee also need to call waitpid to avoid exit after crash so debugger can find the pid of debugee.
If permissions are a problem, you probably will want to use gdbserver. (I almost always use gdbserver when I gdb, docker or no, for numerous reasons.) You will need gdbserver (Deb) or gdb-gdbserver (RH) installed in the docker image. Run the program in docker with
$ sudo gdbserver :34567 myprogram arguments
(pick a port number, 1025-65535). Then, in gdb on the host, say
(gdb) target remote 172.17.0.4:34567
where 172.17.0.4 is the IP address of the docker image as reported by /sbin/ip addr list run in the docker image. This will attach at a point before main runs. You can tb main and c to stop at main, or wherever you like. Run gdb under cgdb, emacs, vim, or even in some IDE, or plain. You can run gdb in your source or build tree, so it knows where everything is. (If it can't find your sources, use the dir command.) This is usually much better than running it in the docker image.
gdbserver relies on ptrace, so you will also need to do the other things suggested above. --privileged --pid=host sufficed for me.
If you deploy to other OSes or embedded targets, you can run gdbserver or a gdb stub there, and run gdb the same way, connecting across a real network or even via a serial port (/dev/ttyS0).
I don't know what you are doing with LD_PRELOAD or your ptrace function.
Why don't you try attaching gdb to a very simple program? Make a program that simply repeatedly prints Hello or something and use gdb --pid [hello program PID] to attach to it.
If that does not work then you really do have a problem.
Another issue is the user ID. Is the program that you are tracing setting itself to another UID? If it is then you cannot ptrace it unless you are using the same user ID or are root.
I have faced the same problem and try a lot of solution but finally, I have found the solution, but really I don't know what the problem was. First I modified the ptrace_conf value and login into Ubuntu as a root but the problem still appears. But the most strange thing that happened is the gdb showed me a message that says:
Could not attach to process. If your uid matches the uid of the target process, check the setting of /proc/sys/kernel/yama/ptrace_scope, or try again as the root user.
For more details, see /etc/sysctl.d/10-ptrace.conf
warning: process 3767 is already traced by process 3755 ptrace: Operation not permitted.
With ps command terminal, the process 3755 was not listed.
I found the process 3755 in /proc/$pid but I don't understand what was it!!
Finally, I deleted the target file (foo.c) that I try to attach it vid gdb and tracer c program using PTRACE_ATTACH syscall, and in the other folder, I created another c program and compiled it.
the problem is solved and I was enabled to attach to another process either by gdb or ptrace_attach syscall.
(gdb) attach 4416
Attaching to process 4416
and I send a lot of signals to process 4416. I tested it with both gdb and ptrace, both of them run correctly.
really I don't know the problem what was, but I think it is not a bug in Ubuntu as a lot of sites have referred to it, such https://askubuntu.com/questions/143561/why-wont-strace-gdb-attach-to-a-process-even-though-im-root
Extra information
If you wanna make changes in the interfaces such as add the ovs bridge, you must use --privileged instead of --cap-add NET_ADMIN.
sudo docker run -itd --name=testliz --privileged --cap-add=SYS_PTRACE --security-opt seccomp=unconfined ubuntu
If you are using FreeBSD, edit /etc/sysctl.conf, change the line
security.bsd.unprivileged_proc_debug=0
to
security.bsd.unprivileged_proc_debug=1
Then reboot.
I am on CentOS 6.4 32 bit and am trying to cause a buffer overflow in a program. Within GDB it works. Here is the output:
[root#localhost bufferoverflow]# gdb stack
GNU gdb (GDB) Red Hat Enterprise Linux (7.2-60.el6_4.1)
Copyright (C) 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law. Type "show copying"
and "show warranty" for details.
This GDB was configured as "i686-redhat-linux-gnu".
For bug reporting instructions, please see:
<http://www.gnu.org/software/gdb/bugs/>...
Reading symbols from /root/bufferoverflow/stack...done.
(gdb) r
Starting program: /root/bufferoverflow/stack
process 6003 is executing new program: /bin/bash
Missing separate debuginfos, use: debuginfo-install glibc-2.12-1.107.el6_4.2.i686
sh-4.1#
However when I run the program stack just on its own it seg faults. Why might this be?
Exploit development can lead to serious headaches if you don't adequately account for factors that introduce non-determinism into the debugging process. In particular, the stack addresses in the debugger may not match the addresses during normal execution. This artifact occurs because the operating system loader places both environment variables and program arguments before the beginning of the stack:
Since your vulnerable program does not take any arguments, the environment variables are likely the culprit. Mare sure they are the same in both invocations, in the shell and in the debugger. To this end, you can wrap your invocation in env:
env - /path/to/stack
And with the debugger:
env - gdb /path/to/stack
($) show env
LINES=24
COLUMNS=80
In the above example, there are two environment variables set by gdb, which you can further disable:
unset env LINES
unset env COLUMNS
Now show env should return an empty list. At this point, you can start the debugging process to find the absolute stack address you envision to jump to (e.g., 0xbffffa8b), and hardcode it into your exploit.
One further subtle but important detail: there's a difference between calling ./stack and /path/to/stack: since argv[0] holds the program exactly how you invoked it, you need to ensure equal invocation strings. That's why I used /path/to/stack in the above examples and not just ./stack and gdb stack.
When learning to exploit with memory safety vulnerabilities, I recommend to use the wrapper program below, which does the heavy lifting and ensures equal stack offsets:
$ invoke stack # just call the executable
$ invoke -d stack # run the executable in GDB
Here is the script:
#!/bin/sh
while getopts "dte:h?" opt ; do
case "$opt" in
h|\?)
printf "usage: %s -e KEY=VALUE prog [args...]\n" $(basename $0)
exit 0
;;
t)
tty=1
gdb=1
;;
d)
gdb=1
;;
e)
env=$OPTARG
;;
esac
done
shift $(expr $OPTIND - 1)
prog=$(readlink -f $1)
shift
if [ -n "$gdb" ] ; then
if [ -n "$tty" ]; then
touch /tmp/gdb-debug-pty
exec env - $env TERM=screen PWD=$PWD gdb -tty /tmp/gdb-debug-pty --args $prog "$#"
else
exec env - $env TERM=screen PWD=$PWD gdb --args $prog "$#"
fi
else
exec env - $env TERM=screen PWD=$PWD $prog "$#"
fi
Here is a straightforward way of running your program with identical stacks in the terminal and in gdb:
First, make sure your program is compiled without stack protection,
gcc -m32 -fno-stack-protector -z execstack -o shelltest shelltest.c -g
and and ASLR is disabled:
echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/randomize_va_space
NOTE: default value on my machine was 2, note yours before changing this.
Then run your program like so (terminal and gdb respectively):
env -i PWD="/root/Documents/MSec" SHELL="/bin/bash" SHLVL=0 /root/Documents/MSec/shelltest
env -i PWD="/root/Documents/MSec" SHELL="/bin/bash" SHLVL=0 gdb /root/Documents/MSec/shelltest
Within gdb, make sure to unset LINES and COLUMNS.
Note: I got those environment variables by playing around with a test program.
Those two runs will give you identical pointers to the top of the stack, so no need for remote script shenanigans if you're trying to exploit a binary hosted remotely.
The address of stack frame pointer when running the code in gdb is different from running it normally. So you may corrupt the return address right in gdb mode, but it may not right when running in normal mode. The main reason for that is the environment variables differ among the two situation.
As this is just a demo, you can change the victim code, and print the address of the buffer. Then change your return address to offset+address of buffer.
In reality, however,you need to guess the return address add NOP sled before your malicious code. And you may guess multiple times to get a correct address, as your guess may be incorrect.
Hope this can help you.
The reason your buffer overflow works under gdb and segfaults otherwise is that gdb disables address space layout randomization. I believe this was turned on by default in gdb version 7.
You can check this by running this command:
show disable-randomization
And set it with
set disable-randomization on
or
set disable-randomization off
I have tried the solution accepted here and It doesn't work (for me). I knew that gdb added environment variables and for that reason the stack address doesn't match, but even removing that variables I can't work my exploit without gdb (I also tried the script posted in the accepted solution).
But searching in the web I found other script that work for me: https://github.com/hellman/fixenv/blob/master/r.sh
The use is basically the same that script in the accepted solution:
r.sh gdb ./program [args] to run the program in gdb
r.sh ./program [args] to run the program without gdb
And this script works for me.
I am on CentOS 6.4 32 bit and am trying to cause a buffer overflow in a program... However when I run the program stack just on its own it seg faults.
You should also ensure FORTIFY_SOURCE is not affecting your results. The seg fault sounds like FORTIFY_SOURCE could be the issue because FORTIFY_SOURCE will insert "safer" function calls to guard against some types of buffer overflows. If the compiler can deduce destination buffer sizes, then the size is checked and abort() is called on a violation (i.e., your seg fault).
To turn off FORTIFY_SOURCE for testing, you should compile with -U_FORTIFY_SOURCE or -D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=0.
One of the main things that gdb does that doesnt happen outside gdb is zero memory. More than likely somewhere in the code you are not initializing your memory and it is getting garbage values. Gdb automatically clears all memory that you allocate hiding those types of errors.
For example: the following should work in gdb, but not outside it:
int main(){
int **temp = (int**)malloc(2*sizeof(int*)); //temp[0] and temp[1] are NULL in gdb, but not outside
if (temp[0] != NULL){
*temp[0] = 1; //segfault outside of gdb
}
return 0;
}
Try running your program under valgrind to see if it can detect this issue.
I think the best way works out for me is to attach the process of the binary with gdb and using setarch -R <binary> to temporarily disable the ASLR protection only for the binary. This way the stack frame should be the same within and without gdb.
I just read about Address Space Layout Randomization and I tried a very simple script to try to brute force it. Here is the program I used to test a few things.
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
int main (int argc, char **argv)
{
char buf[8];
printf("&buf = %p\n", buf);
if (argc > 1 && strcpy(buf, argv[1]));
return 0;
}
I compiled it with this command:
gcc -g -fno-stack-protector -o vul vul.c
I made sure ASLR was enabled:
$ sysctl kernel.randomize_va_space
kernel.randomize_va_space = 2
Then, I came up with this simple script:
str=`perl -e 'print "\x40\xfa\xbb\xbf"x10 \
. "\x90"x65536 \
. "\x31\xc0\x40\x89\xc3\xcd\x80"'`
while [ $? -ne 1 ]; do
./vul $str
done
The format is
return address many times | 64KB NOP slide | shellcode that runs exit(1)
After running this script for a few seconds it exits with error code 1 as I wanted it to. I also tried other shellcodes that call execv("/bin/sh", ...) and I was successful as well.
I find it strange that it's possible to create such a long NOP slide even after the return address. I thought ASLR was more effective, did I miss something? Is it because the address space is too small?
EDIT: I did some additional research and here is what I found:
I asked a friend to run this code using -m32 -z execstack on his 64b computer and after changing the return address a bit, he had the same results.
Even though I did not use -z execstack, I managed to execute the shellcode. I made sure of that by using different shellcodes which all did what they were supposed to do (even the well know scenario chown root ./vul, chmod +s ./vul, shellcode that runs setreuid(0, 0) then execv("/bin/sh", ...) and finally whoami that returns 'root' in the spawned shell).
That is quite strange since execstack -q ./vul tels me the executable stack flag bit is not set. Does anyone have an idea why?
First of all, I'm a bit surprised that you do not need to pass the option -z execstack to the compiler to get the shellcode to execute the exit(1).
Moreover, I guess you are on a 32bits machine as you did not pass the option -m32 to gcc in order to get 32bits code.
Finally, I did run your program without success (I waited way more than a few seconds).
So, I'm a bit doubtful about your conclusion (except if you are running a very peculiar Linux system or may have been lucky).
Anyway, there are two main things that you have not mentionned:
Having a bug that offer an unlimited exploitation windows is quite rare.
Most of the modern systems run on amd64 (64bits) processors, which lower drastically the probability to hit the nop-zone.
You may take a look at the section "ASLR Effectiveness" on the ASLR's Wikipedia page.
When I run programs with segfaults I get an error message Segmentation fault: 11. For some reason, I'm not getting the (core dumped) message. I tried running the shell command ulimit -c unlimited, but I still get the same error and it doesn't say core dumped. I'm new to GDB so I tried it with a simple program:
/* coredump.c */
#include <stdio.h>
int main (void) {
int *point = NULL;
*point = 0;
return 0;
}
But when I compile using:
gcc coredump.c -g -o coredump
And run it, it still says segfault: 11
Is it still creating a core dump somewhere I don't know about? I want to be able to use gdb coredump core.
Look at this link:
How to generate a core dump in Linux when a process gets a segmentation fault?
Options include:
ulimit -c unlimited (default = 0: no core files generated)
the directory for the dump must be writable. By default this is the current directory of the process, but that may be changed by setting /proc/sys/kernel/core_pattern.
in some conditions, the kernel value in /proc/sys/fs/suid_dumpable may prevent the core to be generated.
"man core" for other options
find / -name core -print 2> /dev/null to search your filesystem for core files
I presume you're running Linux, and I presume you're executing the .exe in a directory where you have write permissions.
So my top two guesses would be 1) "ulimit -c unlimited" isn't getting set, or is being overridden, or 2) the core files are being generated, but going "somewhere else".
The above suggestions should help. Please post back what you find!
If you're running the program that crashes from the shell, then you should follow the guidelines in Apple's Tech Note TN2124, which I found out about in in the answer to SO2207233.
There are a few key points:
You need to set ulimit -c unlimited in bash (same effect, different command in tcsh).
You need to set the permissions on the /cores directory so that you can create files in it. The default permissions are 1775; you need 1777. The 1 indicates the sticky bit is set.
The core dumps are then created in /cores suffixed with a PID (/cores/core.5312, for example).
If you want programs launched graphically to dump core when they crash, then you need to create /etc/launchd.conf if it does not already exist, and add a line limit core unlimited to the file. Again, see the information in the Tech Note for more details.
Watch it; core dumps are huge! Consider this not very complicated or big program:
#include <stdio.h>
int main(void)
{
int *i = 0;
int j = 0;
printf("i = %d, j = %d, i / j = %d\n", *i, j, *i / j);
return 0;
}
The core dump from this is nearly 360 MB.
Using gcc, if you add the flags:
gcc -g -dH
you should be able to generate a core dump
The -g flag produces some debugging information to use with gdb, and the -dH flag produces a core dump when there is an error
Sometimes core files are not store in current directory and may follow a different naming rule
sysctl -a | grep kern.core
may give hints to where your core files are stored