I've just run under gdb, with /etc/passwd giving a non-existent home dir. The first warning about not being able to create ~/.gnome2 comes from within gnome_vfs_init(). The `hash_table != NULL' assertion failure comes from within gnome_vfs_transform_get("file"). Ah, I see that gnome_vfs_init returns a boolean indicating success or not, which Inkscape is ignoring. It would be nice if gnome_vfs_init documentation were explicit in saying that one shouldn't call other gnome_vfs functions if it returns false. (E.g. copy from gnome_vfs_initialized documentation.)
I suggest that the fix is to search Inkscape source for use of gnome-vfs, and make them all conditional on gnome_vfs_initialized() (falling back to the corresponding !WITH_GNOME_VFS behaviour if not initialized). See also http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=340234, requesting that gnome-vfs not require $HOME to be writable (or rather not requiring ~/.gnome2 to exist or something). As for whether Inkscape should test $HOME before calling g_get_home_dir, that's (in effect) being discussed at http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=142568 (discussing the desired behaviour/documentation for g_get_home_dir). It has been suggested in that discussion that ignoring $HOME is a good thing; so I suggest waiting a bit to see how that discussion develops before changing inkscape to prefer $HOME over g_get_home_dir. (FWIW, my current opinion is that we should prefer $HOME over getpwent, but I'll see what further evidence gets posted to that discussion.) pjrm. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]