This works w/o segfaulting for me:

bash$ rpm --recompile /etc/rpm
Installing /etc/rpm
error: read failed: Is a directory (21)
error: /etc/rpm cannot be installed
bash$ rpm --recompile /etc/services
Installing /etc/services
error: /etc/services cannot be installed

Coincidence?


$ rpm -q rpm
rpm-4.0.3-1.03


$ rpm --recompile /etc/rpm
Installing /etc/rpm
error: read failed: Is a directory (21)
Segmentation fault


[...]
gettimeofday({1008799960, 651048}, NULL) = 0
brk(0x805f000)                          = 0x805f000
write(2, "error: ", 7error: )                  = 7
write(2, "read failed: Is a directory (21)"..., 33read failed: Is a directory (21)
) = 33
--- SIGSEGV (Segmentation fault) ---
+++ killed by SIGSEGV +++




On a different machine, P1/133 MHz running fully updated Enigma, I get a
completely different behaviour:


$ rpm --recompile /etc/inittab
/etc/inittab: No such file or directory

$ rpm -qf /etc/inittab
initscripts-6.40-1


Any ideas? Looks to me as if RPM could be depending on uninitialized variables
or something like.

I still can't reproduce this problem.

[I've added some comments and a patch to the wrong RPM bug report, bug #50197.]

Debugging revealed that lib/psm.c  rpmInstallSourcePackage(...) defines a
structure "Header h", but doesn't initialize it. It then calls  lib/package.c 
rpmReadPackageHeader(...) with the struct as argument and there returns from
rpmReadPackageHeaders(...) with rc = RPMRC_BADMAGIC and still without having
initialized/cleared the header struct. psm.c then jumps to the exit label where
"h = headerFree(h);" is called shortly after and causes a segfault. The attached
patch which initializes the Header structure is enough to fix this bug on my
system, but might cause a memory leak when the code simply overwrites the
structure later on. Anyway, this should make clear, where the segfault and
misbehaviour is coming from.

Created attachment 41209 [details]
patch which fixes symptoms, but may not be correct

Patch is wrong, initialize to NULL.

Fixed AFAIK in rpm-4.0.3-7x final available from
	ftp://ftp.rpm.org/pub/rpm/dist/rpm-4.0.x

Well, in above comment I did not claim it would be a correct patch. ;-)  Btw,
meanwhile I've found the following comment in both the spec and CHANGES file:

* Mon Aug 13 2001 Jeff Johnson <jbj>
- fix: segfault on headerFree given malicious data.

So, a few months ago you knew about this bug, too, but the real fix has went in
sometime between Enigma and RPM 4.0.3 final. Aha!

Nope, that changelog entry refers to an exploit that
is/was on various security lists this past fall.

*** Bug 60274 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Fyi, I had segfaults with rpmbuild --rebuild file.spec, until today's rpm-build
package update.

I didn't have time to file a report until just now, but then I found that a) it
had been fixed, and b) this report has been closed. ;) But here it is:

$ rpmbuild --rebuild file.spec 
Installing file.spec
Segmentation fault

If I do the same thing today:

$ rpmbuild --rebuild file.spec
Installing file.spec
error: file.spec cannot be installed

(file.spec is an empty file in the example, but it also occurs with valid spec
files.)

The first example is on an RH7.2 machine owned by a friend, I have no control
over whether he will update his packages today or not, but I have a core dump if
you want it.

Whether --rebuild or --recompile, whether "rpm" or "rpmbuild", doesn't matter.
Same bug, same symptoms, and fixed in rpm-4.0.4-7x. No more segfaults doing
stupid things... ;-)