[netflow-tools] softflowd keeps crashing

[alex k]

hi there,

first of all, softflowd is a cool piece of software.
we have it on other linux machines (gateways) and it runs perfectly stable
there.
i use softflowd to collect data and nfsen to capture and evaluate.

but there is one host, where softflowd keeps crashing.
i am a bit clueless as instability doesn't seem to be a problem of softflowd.
at least i didn't find anything in the web or this list.

some information about the host:

kernel (64 bit):
2.6.27.7-9-default #1 SMP 2008-12-04 18:10:04 +0100 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64
GNU/Linux
libpcap version:
libpcap0-0.9.8-47.41
softflowd version:
softflowd-0.9.8 (compiled without problems on that machine)

on this host with one network card runs vmware-server with several guests.
the guests use bridged networking, every has its own ip address, but as
mentioned - there is only one network card.

softflowd crashes occasionally. sometimes once in two weeks, sometimes
twice a day.
the process disappears, the pid file stays.

the only thing i recognized is, that at the same time there are often
flows with completely wrong date (about 6 weeks in the future).
not exactly the same time, of course. when softflowd crashes, the possibly
critical data is lost.

so my questions are:
1) where does softflowd get its time from?
2) can the wrong time be a problem?
3) what else could cause the crashes

especially: how can i find it out.
softflowd is _very_ quiet. nothing in the syslog, no message at all.

thanks in advance for any helpful suggestion.

xela