strace / ltrace

Purpose

Guide agents through tracing system calls with strace and library calls with ltrace — the most effective tools for diagnosing incorrect binary behaviour without a crash or debugger.

Triggers

• "My program behaves incorrectly — how do I trace what it's doing?"
• "How do I find what files a binary is opening?"
• "strace shows ENOENT — how do I interpret it?"
• "How do I trace network calls with strace?"
• "What is ltrace and how does it differ from strace?"
• "How do I trace a running process?"

Workflow

1. Basic strace usage