Smarts Notifier Adapters fail to start on 24.3.X versions

Products

• VMware Smart Assurance
• Network Observability

Issue/Introduction

Smarts Notifier adapters started using the sm_notify utility crash immediately on startup

Environment

Smarts 24.3.X

Cause

The sm_notify crashes immediately on process load due to a NULL-pointer dereference in the version/build-details initialization path.

Specifically, a static initializer calls get_application_build_details() (from SM_Version_Impl), which returns NULL; that value is then passed into CI_String::operator=, causing SIGSEGV before any runtime config is read.

The missing/invalid embedded build metadata for sm_notify or missing null-guard in the initializer is the cause of this issue and is not an OS/environment issue.

Evidences (from crash/backtrace):

• Signal: SIGSEGV (11) at startup (core generated)
• Frames include: CI_String::operator=(a=0x0) → get_application_build_details() → static initializer (_GLOBAL__sub_I_SM_Version_Impl)
• Occurs prior to any server/broker interaction or notifier logic

Resolution

This issue will require a hotfix patch to be shipped in the form of a library. 
Please contact Broadcom Support, quoting this KB article for further assistance.