Troubleshooting

This guide should cover a wide range of issues, but some might be more complicated than that. If you need further assistance, please make sure you read the Support to know the right place to reach us and what information to provide in order for us to be able to help you.

Installation issues

Your game server might not install for many reasons, mainly user based ones, and some distro based. Make sure you answer "yes" to any of these questions.

User and permissions

• Did you create a dedicated user for your server?

• Are you running the script as the right user? Check command: whoami

• Does the user running the script owns its current directory? Check command: ls -al ., see File Ownership

• Does the user have the right permissions on its directories? See Permissions

Dependencies

• Did you install required packages (dependencies) as game page on https://linuxgsm.com requests?

• If sudo isn't installed, did you remove "sudo" from packages install commands?

• If lib32gcc1 libstdc++6 libstdc++6:i386 packages won't install, did you run apt update after dpkg --add-architecture i386?

• If some dependencies are not available, did you check your /etc/apt/sources.list? (Debian based and apt only)

Game server downloads

• Do you have enough disk space on the desired partition? Check command: df -h

• If the server requests a Steam login, did you enter it properly by editing your (example) "gameserver" script? It's a good idea to have a dedicated Steam account for that purpose.

• If the Steam download didn't work as intended, did you retry it, or try the validate command? Maybe your connection to Steam servers is faulty.
• Did you make sure that a firewall doesn't prevent the download from working? Check command: iptables -L ; See Firewalls

Start issues

LinuxGSM servers are designed to work out of the box. However, if your server is unable to start, this can have multiple reasons. Some are user based, some are distro based. Here are some ways of diagnosing it.

Note: (example) ./gameserver details will provide you with relevant information and save you some time. See details

First start issues

• Is the server properly installed? See the "Game server downloads" part

• Are all packages installed properly? See "Dependencies" part

• Is your Linux installation compatible? 32/64bit, distribution... Check command: uname -a

• Are ports already used by another service? See Ports and Multiple-Game-Servers
• Is this a known tmux issue? See Tmux
• Did you try to start with the debug command? See debug
• What does the logs say? See [Logging
• Do you have enough RAM? If not, do you have enough swap? Check command: free -mh

• Did you set an ip in your (example) gameserver script or config file?

Modded servers start issues

• What does the logs say? See [Logging
• Did you try to start with the debug command? See debug
• Did you wrongly append start parameters? See Start-Parameters
• Did you try temporarily removing mods, and adding them one by one?

• Does the user have the right permissions on its directories? If this is the case, a corresponding error should be displayed. See Permissions

Server start issues after updates

• What does the logs say? See [Logging
• Did you try to start with the debug command? See debug
• Did you try to validate your game files? (SteamCMD servers only) See validate
• Is a mod no longer compatible? Try temporarily removing mods, and adding them one by one.

• Is it an editor's error, breaking the server? Does it now require newer package versions? Check forums, alert us if needed by opening a Github issue (and check for existing ones).

Connectivity issues

Unable to connect or not showing up in server list

This is a three part diagnosis: 1) First off, you need to make sure that the server is started properly, take attention to any error messages in console or log output. 2) Check that the server is listening, to the right IP. 3) Check for firewalls or ports redirections that could prevent useful network packets from passing through.

Is the server actually started?

• Start it with (example ./gameserver start , then check server logs (see [Logging) to see if everything seems OK. You can also try the details command and monitor command to see if it's online and if it's able to answer simple queries. If not, then follow the "Start issues" section.

Is the server actually listening?

./gameserver details will provide you with the corresponding command to check if the server process is properly listening. Example sample output:

Useful port diagnostic command:
netstat -atunp | grep srcds_linux

Compare the output from this to expected ports displayed in the details command.

If the output differs or your think something is wrong, here are the things to check on:

• Did you set an ip in your gameserver script or config file or are you listening to 0.0.0.0?

• Are the ports you're using free? See Ports
• Are you listening to an actual interface IP? See Ports Also, double check for typo mistakes.

Isn't there a firewall or a missing NAT rule?

• Are you behind Firewalls? See Firewalls
• If it's a local server, are ports redirection done properly? See Ports and details

Other keys to solving this:

• As usual, first thing you have to ask yourself: What do the logs say? See [Logging
• Did you wait long enough? Sometimes it's just a matter of time until the server is fully started and listed into the master server list.

If none of these work

GitHub is only for bug reports regarding LinuxGSM, not resolving specific user issues.

These kind of install, start or accessibility issues are generally specific to your server or install or comprehension of Linux, so please, note that posting these on GitHub will only result in your issue being closed without an answer and developers' waste of time. Instead, you should use the support methods offered to the community: Discord or Steam Forum as explained in the Support page. There are lot of nice and helpful users and devs follow them as well whenever they have free time.

If you ever confirm a global bug after this, LinuxGSM's developers will be happy to resolve it if you raise an issue on GitHub with as much elements as possible to help understanding, reproducing and resolving the bug quickly.

To learn where and how to get support, see: Support