Hi, I'm having trouble running Wireshark on Mac OS X 10.7.1 Lion - The Install seems to proceed ok, but on running Wireshark I get a window warning me the app may take time to start the first time as the font caches are built, but then it quits. I had a previous version installed, but I have cleaned out /Applications/Wireshark, /Library/StartupItems/ChmodBPF and /opt/local/bin/wireshark (remnant from a previous Macports install) - but there was no /Library/Wireshark. Attempting a reinstallation has no effect, and while /Applications/Wireshark and /Library/StartupItems/ChmodBPF are created again, /Library/Wireshark is not. Behaviour on staring Wireshark is the same - notification message about font caches, and then quit. This happens on subsequent launches of Wireshark too. Any ideas or advice? asked 07 Oct '11, 05:52  James Dore edited 07 Oct '11, 06:53  helloworld |
One Answer:
Aha: The directory ( It now starts and runs as normal. answered 07 Oct '11, 06:27 James Dore edited 21 Jun '12, 21:40 helloworld |
I dont understand this answer can someone else provide more info. what did the job?
I think this is a good explanation (someone feel free to correct me):
The user installed
wiresharkvia MacPorts, which installs all files and directories* asroot, and thus the files and directories are owned byroot. One of the directories MacPorts creates during the installation is~/.wireshark. When the userjamestries to start Wireshark, it loadslibfontconfig, which tries to create a new font cache at~/.wireshark/.fccache-new, but the directory's permissions presumably allowed write-access only to the owner (root), preventing the userjamesfrom creating files there (thus the error:Permission denied).To compensate, @James Dore changed the ownership of the directory
~/.wireshark/to the userjamesso that Wireshark (running asjames) could create the font cache as needed.*Is it really all files? I think so.