[users@httpd] Strategies for debugging a segmentation fault on a production ser ver

[Michael Caplan <michael.caplan@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi there,

 

I am looking for some advice on how to go about debugging Apache 1.3.33 / PHP 5.0.4 on a production Linux box (RHE 3).  The scenario is this:  Once a day we find a segfault in our apache logs.  From our current position, we don't know what page was accessed, and our 400+ users haven't brought the issue to our attention.  All we know is the date/time and PID of when the segfault occurred.  The question is this:  how can we go about isolating the offending requested page that bombs?

 

I've set up a custom apache log file that populates each entry with the PID that handled it.  However, when we do see a segfault, this  log file does not appear to be populated with an entry that corresponds (within a 5 - 10 second period) to the PID that bombs.  I'm guessing that the log file is only written to after a request is delivered?

 

Otherwise, looking at the PHP bugs page, it recommends rebuilding PHP with -enable-debug and running Apache with -X in order to get a core dump.  Running apache with debug mode on is not an option on our production box.  Is running apache -X mandatory to get a core dump?

 

Any other strategies that you can recommend that would help us isolate the offending page so we can get to the good work of reproducing and fixing the problem at hand?

 

Thanks!

 

Michael

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