Worldgroup 2.0: Random Crashes

[rytz]

Greetings:

Anyone know what might cause Worldgroup 2.0 with MajorMUD to crash randomly? Or what configuration settings I could check as a culprit? The only add-ons or mods to WG I have is MajorMUD. There are no audit entries about the crash. The board can be up for an hour or two days, running MajorMUD, with players playing, and the system will crash to the WG Main Menu (before starting the WG server) and be frozen. The users appear to still be connected to the BBS network, but are hung and can't do or receive any input. I have to reset / restart the BBS machine. System is frozen with no input response.

The system is running under VirtualBox. I've tried a ton of different settings (cpu, memory, etc). I still get the crash.

Thoughts?

Thanks.

[BearFather]

There was someone on here that had that issue and it came down to the remote console having an issue. Also it might be a user who remembers and old WG hack and is fucking with your board. Do you notice someone logging in every time right before it?

In truth I think I remember there was an issue in the old days when we switched to an earlier version of WG, we actually reverted our boards back at one point cause of an issue in an early version of WG. Now this is bong resin filled memories from 15-20 yrs ago so take it with a grain of salt.

[Bloodrock]

check in wg folder for a file named galcat.out and galexcep.out and wgserver.out see what they list

[rytz]

Sorry for the delayed response.

I want to use VirtualBox because it gets better performance on DOS than with VMWare. With VMWare, I also got a crash at the console that showed "Out of Interrupt Stacks". My config.sys had STACKS=9,256, so I'm trying 0,0 now, which is what some sites recommend. The difference between the crash on VBox and VMWare is that virtual box drops out to the WG main menu (before the console) and is frozen there, whereas VMWare freezes with the stacks message right at the console. Perhaps both suffer from the stacks problem.

I also have DialSoft-DOS installed. The crash was happening before DS-DOS was installed, though. I've noticed that with VBox, DS-DOS gets loaded after MajorMUD, whereas with VMWare, DS-DOS gets loaded before MajorMUD. Maybe something is happening with the CPU emulation and is causing the crash.

There was someone on here that had that issue and it came down to the remote console having an issue. Also it might be a user who remembers and old WG hack and is fucking with your board. Do you notice someone logging in every time right before it?

In truth I think I remember there was an issue in the old days when we switched to an earlier version of WG, we actually reverted our boards back at one point cause of an issue in an early version of WG. Now this is bong resin filled memories from 15-20 yrs ago so take it with a grain of salt.

Strange. It may be something with the console. This board is local and only for testing.

check in wg folder for a file named galcat.out and galexcep.out and wgserver.out see what they list

I don't see a galcat.out or galexcep.out. I do see a wgserver.out. I'm going to run the server again and wait for a crash. Then recheck these files and post them. Thanks Bloodrock.

[rytz]

Got another crash with zero stacks (0,0). The only *.out file I have is wgserver:

Code: Select all

Module Load Table: 06/29/17 05:18:38

Addr Module                                        Date     Time         Bytes
---- --------------------------------------------- -------- -------- ---------
0177=C:\WGSERV\MAJORBBS.EXE                        06/14/17 18:37:56    892908
0657=C:\WGSERV\GALGSBL.DLL                         06/19/17 04:59:06     45247
067f=C:\WGSERV\BBSBTU.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10      8570
069f=C:\WGSERV\DOSCALLS                           
06bf=C:\WGSERV\GALME.DLL                           03/26/96 02:00:10    138901
072f=C:\WGSERV\GALTEXT.DLL                         03/26/96 02:00:10     14485
29a7=C:\WGSERV\GALTCPIP.DLL                        03/26/96 02:00:10     23189
29ef=C:\WGSERV\GALHPAC.DLL                         03/26/96 02:00:10    216725
2c77=C:\WGSERV\GALPKTR.DLL                         03/26/96 02:00:10     12822
2c97=C:\WGSERV\GALTNTD.DLL                         03/26/96 02:00:10     13973
2ccf=C:\WGSERV\GALMSG.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10    221978
2d5f=C:\WGSERV\GALFIL.DLL                          04/01/96 02:00:10    312602
2ddf=C:\WGSERV\GALP&Q.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10    134426
2e27=C:\WGSERV\GALMJD.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10     31381
2e57=C:\WGSERV\GALREG.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10     22165
2e8f=C:\WGSERV\GALQWK.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10     81045
2ebf=C:\WGSERV\GALCHDIR.DLL                        03/26/96 02:00:10      3733
2ee7=C:\WGSERV\GALTLC.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10     47253
2f2f=C:\WGSERV\GALRSY.DLL                          04/11/96 02:00:10    116885
2f7f=C:\WGSERV\GALTXV.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10      8853
2fa7=C:\WGSERV\BBSFSE.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10     42133
2fe7=C:\WGSERV\GALNOTE.DLL                         03/26/96 02:00:10      5269
300f=C:\WGSERV\GALUIE.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10     18069
3047=C:\WGSERV\GALXIT.DLL                          03/26/96 02:00:10      2709
306f=C:\WGSERV\BBSIGNUP.DLL                        03/26/96 02:00:10      9365
3097=C:\WGSERV\BBSMAINM.DLL                        03/26/96 02:00:10     46229
30d7=C:\WGSERV\WCCMMPLS.DLL                        02/17/05 11:10:46     29333
3117=C:\WGSERV\WCCMMUD.DLL                         06/19/17 05:57:50    927381
33c7=C:\WGSERV\DIALDOS.DLL                         06/20/17 21:21:00     89752
---- --------------------------------------------- -------- -------- ---------

Gonna try max stacks (64, 512).

[rytz]

The random crash is specific to VirtualBox. I can't reproduce in DosBox or VMWare. The VMWare crash was fixed with changing the stacks in config.sys, but not in VirtualBox. Still get the same original crash.

I'm in the process of testing previous versions to see if the crash doesn't happen.

[BearFather]

If it's vbox, try to play with the acceleration tab there is a few settings in there that older OS don't get.

[rytz]

If it's vbox, try to play with the acceleration tab there is a few settings in there that older OS don't get.

I honestly have been trying everything with regards to settings and versions to narrow it down for the past week or so. VirtualBox is the fastest of the big 3 dos emulators (DosBox, VMWare, and VBox), but it seems to be finicky with regards to stability (for WG at least). I'm going to post a write-up soon once I get it stabilized.

I think it's related to using 2 CPUs, which boosts the performance dramatically, but without 2 CPUs, things just seem to slow inside MajorMUD (response times, timers, etc).