ReportCrash(8) BSD System Manager's Manual ReportCrash(8)

NAME
     RReeppoorrttCCrraasshh - crash notification and crash report generation

SYNOPSIS
     RReeppoorrttCCrraasshh

DESCRIPTION
     RReeppoorrttCCrraasshh is the system process responsible for generating crash
     reports and notifying users when an application crashes. A crash report
     contains information that can help a developer diagnose the cause of a
     crash.

     RReeppoorrttCCrraasshh is started automatically by launchd in response to a crash.
     If the crashed process was running in the user's bootstrap context then
     RReeppoorrttCCrraasshh will be started as a LaunchAgent in the same context and the
     crash report will be saved in the user's ~/Library/Logs/CrashReporter/
     directory. If the crashed process was running in the root bootstrap con-
     text then RReeppoorrttCCrraasshh will be started as a LaunchDaemon and the crash
     report will be saved in the system's /Library/Logs/CrashReporter direc-
     tory.

     The filename for the crashreport will be of the format:

     .crash

     The system.log will be used to log the filenames of succesfully saved
     crash reports or any errors that are encountered while reporting a crash.
     If a crash report could not be saved to disk then the contents of the
     crash report will also be written to the system.log.

     A maximum of 20 crash reports will be maintained for any particular
     process, user and host. Once that threshold has been reached the oldest
     crash report will be deleted when a new report is saved.

     For application (as opposed to background process) crashes RReeppoorrttCCrraasshh
     will, by default, display a dialog notifying the user which application
     has crashed and offering the options of ignoring the crash, relaunching
     the crashed application or viewing the crash report and (optionally)
     sending it to Apple.

     Crash reports which are submitted to Apple are analyzed using automated
     mechanisms which assist in identifying and prioritizing problems to be
     fixed in future OS releases. No personal information is gathered and the
     submitter of the crash report will NOT receive any response from Apple.
     User's who need support must use authorized support channels such as
     http://www.apple.com/support.  Developers who are ADC members should
     report bugs using http://bugreporter.apple.com since that channel allows
     for two way communication between Apple and the bug reporter.

     If the developer tools are installed then the CCrraasshhRReeppoorrtteerrPPrreeffss applica-
     tion in /Developer/Applications/Utilities/ can be used to enable a spe-
     cial crash reporting mode for developers. In developer mode crash dialogs
     will be displayed for both background processes and applications. The
     dialogs will contain additional information and they will offer the
     option of attaching to the crashed process with gdb when appropriate.
     Operating in developer mode may result in rare system or application
     deadlocks.

     CCrraasshhRReeppoorrtteerrPPrreeffss can also be used to suppress all crash reporter
     dialogs for unattended operation.

     The generation of crash reports can be disabled entirely by editing both
     the /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.ReportCrash.plist and /Sys-
     tem/Library/LaunchAgetns/com.apple.ReportCrash.plist so that they con-
     tain:

             Disabled
             

     A reboot will be required for the changes to take effect.

     More information about crash reporting and deciphering crash reports can
     be found in Technote 2123: http://developer.apple.com/tech-
     notes/tn2004/tn2123.html

FILES     ~/Library/Logs/CrashReporter/                              user process
                                                                crash reports
     /Library/Logs/CrashReporter/                               system process
                                                                crash reports
     /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.ReportCrash.plist   controls
                                                                launching
                                                                ReportCrash
                                                                for user
                                                                process
                                                                crashes
     /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.ReportCrash.plist  controls
                                                                launching
                                                                ReportCrash
                                                                for system
                                                                process
                                                                crashes

SEE ALSO
     launchd(8), launchd.plist(8)

Mac OS                         December 21, 2019                        Mac OS