Listener Fails To Start With IPC Permission Errors (TNS-12546 TNS-12555 TNS-00516 TNS-00525)

(Doc ID 434062.1)

Last updated on DECEMBER 10, 2017

Applies to:

Oracle Net Services - Version 10.2.0.2 to 11.2.0.4 [Release 10.2 to 11.2]
Oracle Database - Enterprise Edition - Version 12.1.0.2 to 12.1.0.2 [Release 12.1]
Information in this document applies to any platform.
Checked for relevance on 7-MAY-2010.

Symptoms

When we try to start the listener it is failing with permissions errors:

LSNRCTL> start
Starting /app/oracle/product/102/bin/tnslsnr: please wait...

TNSLSNR for Solaris: Version 10.2.0.3.0 - Production
System parameter file is /app/oracle/product/102/network/admin/listener.ora
Log messages written to /app/oracle/product/102/network/log/listener.log
Listening on: (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=ipc)(KEY=meta4)))
Error listening on: (DESCRIPTION=(address=(protocol=ipc)(key=meta3)))
TNS-12546: TNS:permission denied
TNS-12560: TNS:protocol adapter error
  TNS-00516: Permission denied
   Solaris Error: 13: Permission denied

$ lsnrctl start LISTENER

LSNRCTL for Linux: Version 10.2.0.1.0 - Production on 11-JUN-2007 11:05:52

Copyright (c) 1991, 2005, Oracle.  All rights reserved.

Starting /u01/app/oracle/product/10.2.0/db_1/bin/tnslsnr: please wait...

TNSLSNR for Linux: Version 10.2.0.1.0 - Production
System parameter file is /u01/app/oracle/product/10.2.0/db_1/network/admin/listener.ora
Error listening on: (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=IPC)(KEY=EXTPROC2)))
TNS-12555: TNS:permission denied
TNS-12560: TNS:protocol adapter error
  TNS-00525: Insufficient privilege for operation
   Linux Error: 1: Operation not permitted

Listener failed to start. See the error message(s) above...

We have multiple Oracle Homes with listeners running from under different OS users or we are/have been running the same listener under different OS user(s).

Changes

One or more of the following items:

Some IPC keys have been reused from older listener(s)
Same listener has previously been started under different OS users
Listeners running under different OS users are using the same IPC keys
Permissions in /var/tmp have been previously reset.

Cause

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