Linux Quake HOWTO: Troubleshooting/FAQs

5.1 General

OS difference considerations ++

Case sensitivity - In DOS and Windows, case is not important. BASE1.TXT is the same as base1.txt. Under Linux and other unices, case IS significant. MOTD.TXT and motd.txt are different files. This can cause problems with player models and skin files if they're installed with upper- or mixed-case filenames. players/male/santa.PCX needs to be renamed to santa.pcx in order to work in Linux. The fixskins.sh script included with quakeworld will convert all filenames in a directory to lowercase. It's reproduced below for your convenience:
#!/bin/sh for x in *; do y=`echo $x | tr '[A-Z]' '[a-z]'` if [ $x != $y ]; then mv $x $y fi done
Path delimiters - DOS and Windows use the backslash "\" character to separate file pathname elements. In Unix, the backslash is an escape character. If you use file pathnames in your config files (or your mod code, or anywhere else, for that matter), be sure you're using "/" and not "\".
End of line characters - Under DOS/Windows, each line of a text file ends with a carriage return character (CR) and a linefeed character (LF). Unix textfiles just have a linefeed at the end of each line. Using DOS/Win formatted textfiles in Unix can cause all kinds of mysterious Quake problems. Using the incorrectly formatted quake2.conf file from the Quake2 3.17 package, for example, gives the error "LoadLibrary("ref_XXX.so") failed: No such file or directory". LMCTF-TE reports a floating point exception. If you've got an problem you can't explain, try removing the CRs from your text files:
mv file.txt file.bak; tr -d '\r' < file.bak > file.txt

Glibc, RedHat 5.x, Debian 2 considerations **

All of the Quake executables (and the Q2 ref_*.so libraries) were compiled with libc5. Newer Linux distributions like RedHat 5.1 and Debian 2.0 use the incompatible glibc or libc6 as their default C library. If you're running Quake on a glibc system, there are a few things to watch out for:

Both RedHat 5 and Debian 2 have libc5 compatibility packages that allow you to run libc5-based applications. Make sure you have these packages installed. Both distributions put the libc5-based libraries in /usr/i486-linux-libc5/lib, I believe.
Make sure Quake uses the correct libraries. Create a script like the one below that points $LD_LIBRARY_PATH to your compatibility libraries directory before it runs Quake.
```
     #!/bin/sh
     export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/i486-linux-libc5/lib
     ./quake2 +set vid_ref gl $*
     
```
If you are going to upgrade a library like SVGAlib or Mesa, it must be compiled with libc5 and friends. Simply building a new library according its installation instructions will result in a library that is linked against your default library, glibc. You must ensure your new library is linked only with libc5 and libc5-based libraries so it will be compatible with Quake. See your distribution's documentation for information on linking to the non-default libraries.

My mouse doesn't work or seems to respond randomly.

Is gpm running? gpm is a program that enables you to cut and paste with the mouse in virtual consoles. Many distributions enable it by default. It may be interfering with Quake. Check if it's running with the following command:
ps aux | grep gpm
If you get output like
root 6115 0.0 0.4 832 316 ? S 17:54 0:00 gpm -t PS/2
then gpm is running and interfering with Quake. gpm -k (as root) ought to stop gpm. If it doesn't (gpm -k doesn't always work on my system), kill gpm with the command killall gpm. If you never use gpm, you may want to stop it from running at startup. See the documentation for your distribution for information on how to do this.
Is your mouse defined properly in libvga.config? This file usually lives in /etc or /etc/vga. Open it up and look for a line like
mouse Microsoft
On my system, this is the first option in the file. Make sure the mouse type is appropriate for your hardware.

My Microsoft Intellimouse or Logitech MouseMan+ isn't working correctly.

SVGAlib, which handles mouse input for SVGA and GL Quake/QW/Q2, didn't directly support the Intellimouse until version 1.3.0. If you have a version of SVGAlib prior to 1.3.0, you should upgrade, then use mouse type IntelliMouse (for serial mice) or IMPS2 (for PS/2 mice) in your libvga.config file.

My mouse is "laggy" and seems much slower than under Windows.

For many people, just cranking up the value of sensitivity in the game console cures the problem.
From Zoid's 1/7/98 .plan update:
If you are experience video 'lag' in the GL renderer (the frame rate feels like it's lagging behind your mouse movement) type "gl_finish 1" in the console. This forces update on a per frame basis.
The latest version of SVGAlib (1.3.0) provides a slew of parameters in libvga.config that you can use to customize the behavior of your mouse. With the proper settings it should be possible to make your mouse feel any way you want. On my system, just changing mouse_accel_type to normal (default is power) gave me the results I wanted. I haven't messed with the other settings, and I don't pretend to have a clue about what they all do.

I have a Voodoo2, and, when I try to run with the gl renderer, it reports that I don't have a Voodoo installed.

There are different versions of Glide for Voodoo and Voodoo 2 cards. Be sure you downloaded the correct one for your system.

When I'm playing any of the Quake games under SVGAlib or GL and press CTRL-C, the game exits and sometimes leaves my console in an unusable state.

Yes. This bites. SVGAlib catches the CTRL-C and decides what to do with it instead of allowing Quake to handle it. I know of no way around this short of hacking SVGAlib.

If you run your Quake games from a script like the one below, you'll run less chance of ending up with a hosed terminal if this does happen, though.


     #!/bin/sh
     ./quake2 $*
     kbd_mode -a
     reset

squake/quake2 fails to start and says "`svgalib: cannot get I/O permissions"`

The Quake executables must run as root, so you must either run them as root or make them setuid root. See the installation instructions in this document for details.

Sometimes after playing one of the Quake games in X, key repeat doesn't work any more.

For some reason, the X11 versions of Quake disable key repeat while they're running. If the program exits abnormally for some reason, key repeat never get turned back on. Do


     xset r on

to reenable it.

Quake/Quake II says "/dev/dsp : device not configured"

Your sound hardware is not properly configured. You may simply need to do a insmod sound, or it may be necessary to rebuild your kernel. RedHat users may need to invoke the sndconfig(8) utility. See the documentation for your Linux distribution and/or the Linux Sound HOWTO for information on configuring your system's sound hardware.

5.2 Quake/QuakeWorld

Quake dies at startup with a segmentation fault.

This usually means your network setup isn't right. Try starting quake with the -noudp option and see if the error goes away. If that fixes it, check your /etc/hosts file and verify there's an entry for your machine in it. Use 127.0.0.1 for your IP address if you have a dialup account that gives you a different address each time you connect.

5.3 Quake II

When I try to run Quake II with the GL renderer, it fails and says "LoadLibrary("ref_gl.so") failed: Unable to resolve symbol"

If immediately prior to the "Unable to resolve symbol" line, you have messages like "can't resolve symbol 'fxMesaCreateContext'", your Mesa library doesn't have glide support compiled in. See section The GL renderer in the Quake II installation section for information on installing Mesa and glide.

I have a RedHat 5.x system. I just built and installed Mesa 3.0 beta X. Now Quake II segfaults when I try to use the ref_gl renderer.

Did you read Mesa's README.QUAKE before you installed Mesa? This is a glibc problem. Quake II was compiled with lib5. All the libraries it loads must also have been built with libc5.

David Bucciarelli (tech.hmw@plus.it) reported in 3dfx.glide.linux:

I'm using the Mesa-3.0beta7 and the RedHat 5.1 and QuakeII is working fine for me. I had only to make a small change to the Mesa-3.0/mklib.glide file, from:
GLIDELIBS="-L/usr/local/glide/lib -lglide2x -L/usr/i486-linux-libc5/lib -lm"
to:
GLIDELIBS="-L/usr/i486-linux-libc5/lib -lglide2x"
and to make two symbolic links:
[david@localhost Mesa]$ ln -s libMesaGL.so libMesaGL.so.2 [david@localhost Mesa]$ ln -s libMesaGLU.so libMesaGLU.so.2

After correctly compiling the library, you should set your $LD_LIBRARY_PATH to /usr/i486-linux-libc5/lib before you run Quake II. There's a nice Quake II startup script in the README.QUAKE.

I have a RedHat 5.x system and when I try to run Quake II with the GL renderer, it fails with "unable to resolve symbol: IO_putc."

Make sure you're loading the right libc. Try:


     export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/i486-linux-libc5/lib
     ./quake2 +set vid_ref gl

Quake II fails with the message `LoadLibrary("ref_XXX.so") failed: No such file or directory`

/etc/quake2.conf doesn't have the correct path to your Quake II directory in it. This file should contain one line that is the directory Quake II lives in.
If /etc/quake2.conf does contain the correct path, try removing the file and re-creating it by hand. Some versions of Quake II for Linux included an incorrectly formatted quake2.conf file.
Do you have SVGAlib installed? Check /lib, /usr/lib and /usr/local/lib for a file called libvga.so.1.X.X, where the X's are some numbers. If nothing turns up, you need to get and install SVGAlib to run Quake II outside of X.
If the renderer in question is ref_gl.so, Mesa may not be properly installed. Did you copy libMesaGL.so.2.6 to a library directory like the installation instruactions told you to?
If the renderer in question is ref_gl.so, did you install the glide libraries?

Do I need to have my CD mounted to play the single-player missions?

It depends. The readme.linux says you do, and you do if you're using 3.13 or earlier. However, beginning with 3.15 (on all platforms) this checking was taken out, and you don't have to have your CD mounted in order to play single-player.

When I update the brightness while using the GL renderer, and hit "apply," nothing happens!

Type vid_restart in the console to make the changes take affect.

When I try to run `fixperms.sh`, it says `Command not found`.

fixperms.sh has MS-DOS line endings in 3.17. See section Note about the 3.17 distribution for details on how to fix this.

Quake II and the GL renderer run slower in Linux than in Windows. **

Yes it is. The simple fact of the matter is that, right now, the Windows GL "Quake II miniport" is heavily optimized for the things Quake II does. Mesa on the other hand, is more general and less optimized As a result, Linux Quake II runs slower than under Windows. This isn't a limitation of Linux, but a limitation of the current drivers. Regardless, we all owe a big debt to Daryll Strauss, who brought us the 3Dfx drivers, and Brian Paul, who brought us Mesa. Without them, we'd be stuck in software-rendering land, which is MUCH slower than what we have now.

Additionally, for Pentium Pro and Pentium II users, there are some tweaks than can be done with memory buffering - the latest /dev/3dfx device driver has support for automatically setting this up for you.

See http://glide.xxedgexx.com/MTRR.html for some more detailed information about this.

Dave 'Zoid' Kirsch said in his 13 Aug 1998 .plan update that he has ported 3Dfx's OpenGL miniport to Linux. This will be used in place of Mesa for GL Quake and Quake II. Good news!

5. Troubleshooting/FAQs