Fixing the @#$!! RMagick.bundle: [BUG] Bus Error

October 27, 2006

After upgrading gems on my Macbook Pro a few months ago, I started getting this horrible error whenever I tried to get to my application’s console in Rails.

The-Me:~/Sites/socialight michael$ script/console
Loading development environment.
/usr/local/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rmagick-1.14.1/lib/RMagick.bundle: [BUG] Bus Error
ruby 1.8.4 (2005-12-24) [i686-darwin8.6.1]

Abort trap

I tried everything. Reinstalling Ruby, Rails and the RMagick gem. Downloading new versions of ImageMagick and GraphicsMagick as discussed here. I threw DarwinPorts, fink, HiveLogic and even resorted to reading installation instructions, all to no avail. script/console seemed destined to be something I used on other machines, something I watched others caress lovingly. *sigh*

Then, one day, after half an hour of my usual round of aimless download and reinstallation of ImageMagick and GraphicsMagick, I finally got it. I randomly started reading the non-OS X install instructions for RMagick which pointed out that by adding the “–with-graphics-magick” option to ./configure, it forces RMagick to use GraphicsMagick instead of ImageMagick. Voila! It’s all working. Yippee!

There are 3 comments in this article:

  1. 28/12/2006leftist says:

    Well, that’s a shame. I installed GraphicsMagick and recompiled RMagick, but I’m still having the same problem.

    Thing is, my problem is only occuring when I attempt to run an RMagick annotate function. Loading script/console shouldn’t be doing anything like what you’re describing unless you are requiring RMagick in your .irbrc or something.

    Stupid “Bus error”! That it’s prefaced by [BUG] would seem to add insult to injury.

  2. 4/01/2007michael says:

    I had this issue because I was requiring RMagick in my environment.rb, so whenever I loaded it up – it would crash.

    Funnily enough, since solving this issue – I’ve now switched to using GD and the same issue happens again! Haven’t been able to fix it this time. I guess I’m just a sucker for punishment.
    ;)

  3. 19/03/2008Installing RMagick on OS X Leopard says:

    [...] After the last time, I swore I’d never fall prey to RMagick’s convoluted and painful installation process. Unfortunately, to paraphrase the Giant – it happened again. [...]

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