Minetest 5.0.1 crashing on 2015 MacBook Pro

[JavaFXpert]

A couple of users have reported that Minetest 5.0.1 crashes when invoking it. Here are the specs for one of the user's machines:
MacOS: 10.14.6
MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Early 2015)

This user used the installation from the following page:
https://www.techspot.com/downloads/5585-minetest.html

When I asked the user to try the brew installation, his response was that he installed it and started the server but can’t connect.

What would be a good next thing for this user to try?

[sfan5]

This user used the installation from the following page:
https://www.techspot.com/downloads/5585-minetest.html

I recommend against downloading Minetest (or any software) from "random" download sites like that one.

What would be a good next thing for this user to try?

There are some nightly builds provided by a community member, perhaps those will work.

[texmex]

There’s nothing wrong with the brew builds AFAIK. Is the user behind a system firewall perhaps?

On a very serious note, the fact that the user ended up downloading the client from a fishy website is a clear result of the developer team not providing official macOS builds. Who knows what type of malware can be distributed in Minetest’s name simply because no dev cared to set up a dead simple Travis build bot?

[Zen]

Well, it appears to contain cryptocurrency mining code.
I think they rely on the unwary visitor to just download and install it.

Here's the post-mortem:


Resources
----------
17,632,328 Altered Version
17,632,328 Mojave Version
----------
0 Difference


Program
----------
10,792,188 Altered Version
9,842,008 Mojave Version
----------
950,180 Difference


Libraries
----------
8,641,452 Altered Version
4,777,705 Mojave Version
----------
3,863,747 Difference


Doesn't contain libjpeg9 but does contain libjpeg8.


Does contain:

libcrypto -- Cryptographic API.
libgmp -- GNU multiple precision arithmetic library.
libhiredis -- Minimalist C client library for Redis database.
libICE -- Inter-client exchange.
libleveldb -- Key-value storage with ordered mappings.
libpq -- Postgre SQL database.
libsnappy -- Fast compressor decompressor.
libSM -- Sessions manager.
libssl -- TLS Crypto SSL.
libtcmalloc -- Thread catching Malloc.

[Krock]

libcrypto -> Not a MT dependency. Check libgmp dependencies
libgmp -> For SRP authentication. Bundled mini-version is also available in MT.
libhiredis -> Redis DB backend (map)
libICE -> Not a MT dependency
libleveldb -> LevelDB backend (map)
libpq -> PostgreSQL backend (map)
libsnappy -> LevelDB dependency
libSM -> Not a MT dependency
libssl -> Used by cURL, probably
libtcmalloc -> Platform-specific Semaphore/Threading library (I believe)

[texmex]

This is beyond bad for the potential reputation of Minetest. Why?

- Players on macOS risks being seriously owned and will blame Minetest for it.
- Minetest executables risks being blacklisted in malware scanners and anti-virus software.

The result in both cases is that Minetest loses credibility as legitimate software and, most of all, players.

This can be avoided simply by providing official builds on the website.

[sfan5]

Well, it appears to contain cryptocurrency mining code.
I think they rely on the unwary visitor to just download and install it.

How do you come to this conclusion?

About the libraries:
libcrypto -> belongs to libssl
libICE -> belongs to X11
libSM -> belongs to X11
libtcmalloc -> alternative malloc implementation, probably used by libpq or leveldb

- Minetest executables risks being blacklisted in malware scanners and anti-virus software.

Unlikely.

[Zen]

I've went back to the site a half dozen times and poked everything with a very long stick. I found nothing wrong with the files, just a bad link. The MacOS 5.0.1 link just downloads the 2019 June 4 development version, not the the 2019 March 31 release.

Since I had no familiarity with the 5.1.0 development version, I didn't recognize any of the new files added. When I typed the partial list of libraries into DuckDuckGo search engine I got a list of web sites with cryptocurrency mining software.