Bzflag wont start on Ubuntu 9.10

[paulgraz]

IBM T42 laptop, 2gb ram, running Ubuntu 9.10

Loaded game through the Ubuntu software center

When I try to start the game, a window flashes on the screen for a split-second.

Trying to run from command line returns "segmentation fault"

Ditto for "bzflag -window" or "bzflag -window -geometry 800x600" or "bzflag -window -geometry 640x480"

Shrug...

[blast]

Do any other OpenGL games work? (Or even glxgears?) Have you tried turning off desktop effects (if you have them enabled)?

[paulgraz]

Turned off desktop effects. No change. I just read in another thread from a while back something about disabling the screen saver - have not tried that yet. Will do that when I get home tonight.

The only other games on this machine is whatever came loaded with Ubuntu. Simple stuff like mahjong, etc. This is the first "real" game I've loaded. Are there underlying OpenGL prerequisites I should have loaded first?

[blast]

Open a terminal and run glxgears. It's a very basic OpenGL application - if that fails, then there is something seriously wrong with your current setup.

There is also glxinfo that will provide more information about your current setup.

Which ATI mobility chip does your laptop have? And do you know what graphics driver you are using? I think there's at least 2 or 3 of them for ATI cards (though not every driver supports every card).

If you aren't sure what chip you have, the lspci (that's an LS, not a IS) command should be able to identify what you have.

[paulgraz]

Open a terminal and run glxgears. It's a very basic OpenGL application - if that fails, then there is something seriously wrong with your current setup.

glxgears ran just fine.

There is also glxinfo that will provide more information about your current setup.

Here's the result (I hope this isn't TOO MUCH info...)

name of display: :0.0
display: :0 screen: 0
direct rendering: Yes
server glx vendor string: SGI
server glx version string: 1.2
server glx extensions:
GLX_ARB_multisample, GLX_EXT_import_context, GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap,
GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_MESA_copy_sub_buffer,
GLX_OML_swap_method, GLX_SGI_make_current_read, GLX_SGI_swap_control,
GLX_SGIS_multisample, GLX_SGIX_fbconfig, GLX_SGIX_visual_select_group
client glx vendor string: SGI
client glx version string: 1.4
client glx extensions:
GLX_ARB_get_proc_address, GLX_ARB_multisample, GLX_EXT_import_context,
GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_MESA_allocate_memory,
GLX_MESA_copy_sub_buffer, GLX_MESA_swap_control,
GLX_MESA_swap_frame_usage, GLX_OML_swap_method, GLX_OML_sync_control,
GLX_SGI_make_current_read, GLX_SGI_swap_control, GLX_SGI_video_sync,
GLX_SGIS_multisample, GLX_SGIX_fbconfig, GLX_SGIX_pbuffer,
GLX_SGIX_visual_select_group, GLX_EXT_texture_from_pixmap
GLX version: 1.2
GLX extensions:
GLX_ARB_get_proc_address, GLX_ARB_multisample, GLX_EXT_import_context,
GLX_EXT_visual_info, GLX_EXT_visual_rating, GLX_MESA_copy_sub_buffer,
GLX_MESA_swap_control, GLX_MESA_swap_frame_usage, GLX_OML_swap_method,
GLX_SGI_make_current_read, GLX_SGI_swap_control, GLX_SGI_video_sync,
GLX_SGIS_multisample, GLX_SGIX_fbconfig, GLX_SGIX_visual_select_group
OpenGL vendor string: Tungsten Graphics, Inc.
OpenGL renderer string: Mesa DRI R100 (RV200 4C57) 20090101 AGP 4x x86/MMX/SSE2 TCL
OpenGL version string: 1.3 Mesa 7.6
OpenGL extensions:
GL_ARB_draw_buffers, GL_ARB_imaging, GL_ARB_multisample,
GL_ARB_multitexture, GL_ARB_texture_border_clamp,
GL_ARB_texture_compression, GL_ARB_texture_cube_map,
GL_ARB_texture_env_add, GL_ARB_texture_env_combine,
GL_ARB_texture_env_crossbar, GL_ARB_texture_env_dot3,
GL_ARB_texture_mirrored_repeat, GL_ARB_texture_rectangle,
GL_ARB_transpose_matrix, GL_ARB_vertex_buffer_object, GL_ARB_window_pos,
GL_EXT_abgr, GL_EXT_bgra, GL_EXT_blend_color, GL_EXT_blend_logic_op,
GL_EXT_blend_minmax, GL_EXT_blend_subtract, GL_EXT_compiled_vertex_array,
GL_EXT_convolution, GL_EXT_copy_texture, GL_EXT_draw_range_elements,
GL_EXT_fog_coord, GL_EXT_histogram, GL_EXT_multi_draw_arrays,
GL_EXT_packed_depth_stencil, GL_EXT_packed_pixels, GL_EXT_polygon_offset,
GL_EXT_rescale_normal, GL_EXT_secondary_color,
GL_EXT_separate_specular_color, GL_EXT_stencil_wrap, GL_EXT_subtexture,
GL_EXT_texture, GL_EXT_texture3D, GL_EXT_texture_edge_clamp,
GL_EXT_texture_env_add, GL_EXT_texture_env_combine,
GL_EXT_texture_env_dot3, GL_EXT_texture_filter_anisotropic,
GL_EXT_texture_lod_bias, GL_EXT_texture_mirror_clamp,
GL_EXT_texture_object, GL_EXT_texture_rectangle, GL_EXT_vertex_array,
GL_APPLE_packed_pixels, GL_ATI_texture_env_combine3,
GL_ATI_texture_mirror_once, GL_IBM_multimode_draw_arrays,
GL_IBM_rasterpos_clip, GL_IBM_texture_mirrored_repeat,
GL_MESA_ycbcr_texture, GL_MESA_window_pos, GL_NV_blend_square,
GL_NV_light_max_exponent, GL_NV_texture_rectangle,
GL_NV_texgen_reflection, GL_OES_read_format, GL_SGI_color_matrix,
GL_SGI_color_table, GL_SGIS_generate_mipmap, GL_SGIS_texture_border_clamp,
GL_SGIS_texture_edge_clamp, GL_SGIS_texture_lod, GL_SUN_multi_draw_arrays

8 GLX Visuals
visual x bf lv rg d st colorbuffer ax dp st accumbuffer ms cav
id dep cl sp sz l ci b ro r g b a bf th cl r g b a ns b eat
----------------------------------------------------------------------
0x21 24 tc 0 32 0 r y . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 None
0x22 24 dc 0 32 0 r y . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 None
0x62 24 tc 0 32 0 r . . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 16 16 16 16 0 0 Slow
0x63 24 tc 0 32 0 r y . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 16 16 16 16 0 0 Slow
0x64 24 dc 0 32 0 r . . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 None
0x65 24 dc 0 32 0 r . . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 16 16 16 16 0 0 Slow
0x66 24 dc 0 32 0 r y . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 16 16 16 16 0 0 Slow
0x59 32 tc 0 32 0 r . . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 Ncon

8 GLXFBConfigs:
visual x bf lv rg d st colorbuffer ax dp st accumbuffer ms cav
id dep cl sp sz l ci b ro r g b a bf th cl r g b a ns b eat
----------------------------------------------------------------------
0x5a 0 tc 0 32 0 r . . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 None
0x5b 0 tc 0 32 0 r . . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 16 16 16 16 0 0 Slow
0x5c 0 tc 0 32 0 r y . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 None
0x5d 0 tc 0 32 0 r y . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 16 16 16 16 0 0 Slow
0x5e 0 dc 0 32 0 r . . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 None
0x5f 0 dc 0 32 0 r . . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 16 16 16 16 0 0 Slow
0x60 0 dc 0 32 0 r y . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 0 0 0 0 0 0 None
0x61 0 dc 0 32 0 r y . 8 8 8 8 0 24 8 16 16 16 16 0 0 Slow

Which ATI mobility chip does your laptop have? And do you know what graphics driver you are using? I think there's at least 2 or 3 of them for ATI cards (though not every driver supports every card).

If you aren't sure what chip you have, the lspci (that's an LS, not a IS) command should be able to identify what you have.

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon Mobility M7 LW [Radeon Mobility 7500]

[blast]

Hmmm, okay, so it does seem like it's set up for 3D acceleration using the open-source "radeon" driver, which I believe is the only option for that old of a graphics chip.

The only other things that I could think to try would be another 3D game, such as Armagetron, to see if that works. Or the other option is to build the BZFlag client from source with debugging enabled (passing --enable-debug to the configure script) and then debugging it with gdb (either directly, or setting the ulimit for core files high enough and then loaded the core file from the segfault into gdb).

[paulgraz]

OK, you lost me there a little - but I'll try loading the game you suggested and we'll go from there.

Thanks very much for all your help so far!

[paulgraz]

Hmmm, okay, so it does seem like it's set up for 3D acceleration using the open-source "radeon" driver, which I believe is the only option for that old of a graphics chip.

The only other things that I could think to try would be another 3D game, such as Armagetron, to see if that works.

Armagetron (advanced) did not work either. That game loads and allows me to browse the menus, but when I try to actually play, it dies. No segmentation fault, but still not working.

I've resigned myself to the fact that this laptop just doesn't have a video system robust enough for these games. I'll wait until I'm done building my next desktop and try again with that machine...

Thanks again

[Avatar]

Chiming in to report that I'm having the exact same situation (bzflag segfaults on load, but glxgears/other ogl packages run fine) with an ATI Radeon 9250 under 9.10. Might need to bug report this to Canonical and AMD as this may be compatibility issue between Karmic and older (dropped before Cat7) ATI graphics systems. Other possibility is that something else was changed in the bugfixes between Jaunty and Karmic that broke bzflag.

EDIT: After updating xorg, xfree86, and all of the various ATI driver packages (including installing the dbg packages), I am no longer getting a segfault when starting bzflag. However, the game is still failing to run (not even bothering to attempt opening a display now) and running from the console presents the following:

Code: Select all

X Error of failed request:  BadRequest (invalid request code or no such operation)
  Major opcode of failed request:  135 (GLX)
  Minor opcode of failed request:  19 (X_GLXQueryServerString)
  Serial number of failed request:  17
  Current serial number in output stream:  17

As a side note, I've also just now noticed that snes9x-x has also lost the ability to go fullscreen, complaining about insufficient permissions on the video display even when run under gksudo. This is definitely starting to look more and more like an ATI display driver compatibility issue with Karmic.

[JeffM]

run bzflag with -window -geometry 800x600 to force it into windowed mode. This usually helps on drivers that have fullscreen problems.

[Avatar]

No joy. Running bzflag with no command line options produces an error message similar to above, while using the '-window -geometry" options results in a segfault when the menu comes up (I get a display for less than a second before losing the window and getting the segfault error in the terminal window).

[JeffM]

Then yes, you have a bad display driver.

[Avatar]

And clearing away and re-installing the driver packages doesn't solve the problem, which really sucks, because it's the only driver (xserver-xorg-video-ati and xserver-xorg-video-radeon) that's stil vaguely supported for ATI cards that aren't covered by Catalyst 9.10...

EDIT: Found a minor fix for now. Still can't get fullscreen at launch, but I now get a stable open with -window. Since X no longer creates an xorg.conf file in Karmic, I created an empty one (/etc/X11/xorg.conf) and filled with just the following (found these settings on another site - note that while they provided a fix for me, they may not work for anybody else):

Code: Select all

Section "Device"
    Identifier      "Configured Video Device"
    Driver  "radeon"
    Option  "AccelDFS" "on"
    Option  "AccelMethod" "XAA"
    Option  "MigrationHeuristic" "smart"
    Option  "EnablePageFlip" "on"
    Option  "EnableDepthMoves" "on"
    Option  "ColorTiling" "on"
    Option  "FBTexPercent" "0"
    Option  "AGPMode" "4"
    Option  "TripleBuffer" "true"
EndSection

[Saul of Tarsus]

Fresh install of Ubuntu 9.10 on Dell Latitude D600, bzflag won't start and when I type bzflag in terminal it says "Segmentation fault".

[blast]

Make sure to install a proper video driver for the ATI 9000 Mobility that you have in that laptop.

I'd also recommend reading through the entire thread to see if anything helps, such as the post right above yours.

[Propane Tank]

I have the same problemo on my 64MB ATI card, bzflag works fine though on the 16MB [both ATI]. But my 16MB isn't big enough to play with decent graphics, and my mouse is literally like a brick.

[Avatar]

I'd guess that the 16MB card runs off the Rage128 (r128) drivers referenced by the ati wrapper, while the 64MB card uses the radeon driver (like the other cards mentioned so far in this thread). All of the info I had gathered previously had only mentioned the radeon driver specificially and I didn't see anything out there regarding problems or fixes for r128. Granted, I wasn't exactly looking, either.