> Since you're now building notmuch from source, could you build it with > make clean && make CFLAGS=-g and run it under gdb again to get a > backtrace? I don't understand why strace didn't show it opening any > mail, but with debug symbols the backtrace should hopefully tell us > that. Perhaps this will help: yabai@newb:~$ strace -eopen notmuch new open("/etc/ld.so.cache", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/usr/local/lib/libnotmuch.so.2", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/usr/lib/libgmime-2.4.so.2", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libgobject-2.0.so.0", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libglib-2.0.so.0", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/usr/lib/libtalloc.so.2", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpthread.so.0", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libc.so.6", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/usr/lib/sse2/libxapian.so.22", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libgcc_s.so.1", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libgmodule-2.0.so.0", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libgthread-2.0.so.0", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/librt.so.1", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libz.so.1", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libnsl.so.1", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpcre.so.3", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libuuid.so.1", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libm.so.6", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libdl.so.2", O_RDONLY) = 3 open("/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/charset.alias", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) open("/usr/share/locale/locale.alias", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 3 open("/home/yabai/.notmuch-config", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 3 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/flintlock", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC|O_LARGEFILE, 0666) = 3 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/iamchert", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 3 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/record.DB", O_RDWR|O_LARGEFILE) = 3 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/record.baseA", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 5 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/record.baseB", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 5 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/spelling.DB", O_RDWR|O_LARGEFILE) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/synonym.DB", O_RDWR|O_LARGEFILE) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/termlist.DB", O_RDWR|O_LARGEFILE) = 5 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/termlist.baseA", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/termlist.baseB", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 6 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/position.DB", O_RDWR|O_LARGEFILE) = 6 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/position.baseA", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 7 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/position.baseB", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/postlist.DB", O_RDWR|O_LARGEFILE) = 7 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/postlist.baseA", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 8 open("/home/yabai/Mail/.notmuch/xapian/postlist.baseB", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 8 open("/home/yabai/Mail", O_RDONLY|O_NONBLOCK|O_LARGEFILE|O_DIRECTORY|O_CLOEXEC) = 8 open("/home/yabai/Mail/Sent", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 8 open("/etc/localtime", O_RDONLY) = 9 open("/home/yabai/Mail/Sent", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 9 --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- open("/home/yabai/Mail/old.mail", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 8 --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- open("/home/yabai/Mail/old.mail", O_RDONLY|O_LARGEFILE) = 9 --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- --- SIGALRM (Alarm clock) @ 0 (0) --- open("/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/gconv/gconv-modules.cache", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory) open("/usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/gconv/gconv-modules", O_RDONLY) = 10 GLib-ERROR **: /build/buildd/glib2.0-2.28.6/./glib/gmem.c:239: failed to allocate 2147483648 bytes aborting... --- SIGABRT (Aborted) @ 0 (0) --- +++ killed by SIGABRT +++ Aborted yabai@newb:~$