When I login using SSH, all I can see is this...
-bash: /usr/bin/id: cannot execute binary file
-bash: [: : integer expression expected
I couldn't do anything in here. Commands such as halt, poweroff, reboot will return command not found.
How can I fix this? I am using Debian Squeeze Linux
Usually that error message means Linux doesn't recognize the file as a shell script or as an executable file.
Typically the cause is running an executable on the wrong architecture - if you try to run x86 executables on an ARM CPU, this message comes up.
Did /usr/bin/id get overwritten, possibly?
Try to run it using ./executablefilename instead of using sh executablefilename. It's not a shell script after all.
./kiwix-serve
– cchapman
Jun 19 '18 at 15:38
The problem is running a binary for a different processor architecture. You can use objdump (from binutils) to check architecture of binaries. You can use uname to check architecture of a machine.
e.g. I encountered this error "cannot execute binary file" when installing FF.Communicator - a firefox plugin for chrome (so I can run pages that use java applets).
objdump shows the binary is 64-bit elf64-x86-64
uname shows my machine is 32-bit i686
$ ./FF.Communicator
bash: ./FF.Communicator: cannot execute binary file
$ uname -mpio
i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux
$ objdump -a ./FF.Communicator
./FF.Communicator: file format elf64-x86-64
./FF.Communicator
objdump on a working binary on my machine shows it is 32-bit elf32-i386
$ objdump -a /bin/ls
/bin/ls: file format elf32-i386
Using these tools you can check architectures of machines and binaries - not just intel architectures but any processor.
For Mac OSX users, you can find out the architecture info of a specific file using the "file" command:
$ file filename_here
/bin/objdump -f -- '/usr/bin/id' | sed -rne 's/^architecture: (.*),.*$/\1/p'; also.
– Artfaith
Nov 19 '23 at 08:27
I'm making some wild guesses here, but it looks like the following is happening:
bash to run your ~/.profile or ~/.bashrc to set up your environment for you (this is normal)./bin/id to get your uid, which fails, causing integer expression error, and terminating the script before it can set up your $PATH.$PATH is not set, bash is only able to run commands with the full path specified.Use export PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin to fix the $PATH issue until you can fix the root cause of /bin/id failing.
This means that you are trying to execute a binary file using your bash script which is not intended to be run as you trying it to be. It is already a binary file and you are trying your $SHELL to parse and run it.
in a very simple example, if you try to run `w' command like
$ bash w
/usr/bin/w: /usr/bin/w: cannot execute binary file
similarly you might be hitting the same method or as it looks from your code snippet.
While , for the remaining for your commands, Al these halt, shutdown , reboot etc commands are the root owned commands and need super-user prilveges to run and perform the required operation. normal users can't run them another explanation is that these commands are placed at /sbin/ and /usr/sbin , which might not be in your $PATH variable ( which is used to validate commands in your custody )
CMD, thank you
– Benyamin Limanto
Jan 19 '23 at 06:24
/bin/bash -c w meaning that bash should not try to interpret /usr/bin/w as a shell script but rather run the one-line shell script containing: "w".
– JohannesB
Oct 26 '23 at 11:13
You are running wrong version of the installer, for example, 64bit machine and trying to install 32bit version of the installer.
To add a wee bit to LawrenceC's perfect answer:
I recently encountered this error on some gcc-compiled files:
~/c_trials $ ./bb05
-bash: ./bb05: cannot execute: required file not found
I thought I was going insane... a real wtfo moment. I finally figured it out:
I had recently moved this file (and the folder w/ all the files) from my Raspberry Pi 3 running
bullseyeto this Raspberry Pi 5 runningbookworm.
After re-compiling on the RPi 5, everything was copacetic (not insane):
~/c_trials $ gcc -o bb05 bb05.c
~/c_trials $ ./bb05
blah, blah, blah
glibc version may also upset your apple cart.
binary file consists of machine instructions the processor can understand. Your operating system does not mean the same executable will run. move back and forth between the processor instruction set compatible with will usually work well, if they are not compatible CPU will not be able to understand instructions.
export PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin? Can the shell find halt/poweroff/reboot then? (Note, I'd advise not shutting down the system unless you know you can bring it back up, or have accepted that you might have to boot from a live-CD and fix everything manually) – Darth Android Jun 12 '12 at 21:37PATHis an environment variable which contains a list of folders which the shell searches for programs.lsfor example, usually refers to/bin/ls, and your shell finds it by going through the folders listed inPATHone-by-one until it finds it, or if it doesn't find it in any of them, it gives up. I suppose a better starting point would be, what is the output ofecho $PATH? (edit: theexportcommand is a way to define an environment variable in bash.) – Darth Android Jun 12 '12 at 21:41export PATH=/bin:/user/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin. It's a silent command. – Ben Richards Jun 12 '12 at 21:57