Bookmarks+ list bookmarks crashes Emacs

Question

I am using Ubuntu 12.04 and GNU Emacs 23.3.1.

I just tried the bookmarks+ library (http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/BookmarkPlus) I downloaded the files from that site, e.g. bookmarks+.el from http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/download/bookmark%2b.el

I put the files in my ~/emacs directory, and I put

(setq load-path
      (append (list nil "~/emacs")
              load-path))
(require 'bookmark+)

in my ~/.emacs startup file. To debug I have deleted everything else in my ~/.emacs..

To make it simple, lets say I now start Emacs as follows:

bash$ emacs ~/.emacs &

Then I add a single bookmark using C-x p m, and then enter C-x r l to bring up the bookmarks buffer, and I get the follwing screen shot:

Now there are several ways to make Emacs crash:

• I can just wait some seconds
• I can try to change buffer with C-x b
• I can select the bookmark and then return to the .emacs buffer, and then press C-x b again..

When it crashes the frame is grayed and nothing happens, whereas in the Gnome terminal I get the error message

*** glibc detected *** emacs: realloc(): invalid next size: 0x000000000228e1a0 ***

Answer 1

If you have the same problem after trying a different Emacs build (order not too important, and items are not necessarily related -- i.e., try one or more of these things):

1. Remove nil from your sexp that updates load-path. And remove ~/.emacs, unless it is a directory. load-path should be a list of directory names. And it should include the directory where the Bookmark+ files are located. Typically, you do (add-to-list 'load-path "/some/directory") to add a directory to load-path.

2. For your testing, unless you have already done so, remove your bookmarks file. IOW start from zero, as you tried to do by emptying your .emacs. Start with no bookmarks.

3. What happens if you do the same things (e.g. C-x r l followed by C-x b) without loading Bookmark+, i.e., using the vanilla Emacs bookmark code?

4. Remove any byte-compiled Bookmark+ files, so you use *.el files, not *.elc. Then set debug-on-error to t. (But if Emacs is crashing then you probably won't get a Lisp backtrace.)

5. Try M-x debug-on-entry switch-to-buffer (or whatever other function you think the crash might occur in), and then step through the debugger using d (or skip through parts you don't care about, using c). For the most clarity (detail), load the Lisp source file that defines the function that you pass to debug-on-entry. E.g., if it is switch-to-buffer then in recent Emacs builds the file would be window.el. Do C-h f switch-to-buffer (or whatever function) to see just what file to load. Load the file using load-file or load-library (with an explicit .el suffix), not require, so you load the *.el.

6. Every Emacs crash indicates an Emacs bug (Emacs should never crash). If the crash creates a file emacs_backtrace.txt in the current directory then use M-x report-emacs-bug and include that file in your bug report.

7. If debugging this helps narrow down the cause of the crash, then consider using M-x report-emacs-bug to report the narrowed-down recipe to reproduce the crash.