Rsync --daemon v 2.5.5 v26 causing kernel panic

[Edward King]

Has anyone seen this?  Looking for past experiences / ideas.  Will post 
progress.

I'm tracking down a problem that seems to be caused by rsync.  When 
moving files from a remote server I get a kernel panic.



We have a number of servers that back up to a main box -- the panic only 
occurs when a specific client backs up.  It occurs on the box it is 
backing up to -- not the client.

The kernel is Linux 2.4.20 (just compiled -- no patches), files are 
stored on a 4 disk raid (80GB Western Digital drives, software raid) 
with Reiserfs.  This is being done over a vpn connection controlled by 
another machine (gateway machine) running tinc so we're not using ssh or 
any other shell on the rsync machine.

I have:

recompiled rsync at both locations
recompiled the kernel from new source code (panic in 2.4.19, system 
rebooted in 2.4.20)

I will:

try different hardware
run a file system check at the main system (the one that crashes)
exclude directories in the backup (rsync one directory at a time -- see 
where it crashes)

I did notice filenames on the client machine that contain control 
characters -- but they seem to have backed up before.