Strange gnome-config problem

[John Coppens <john jcoppens com>]

I know, gnome-config is deprecated.

This is an older test program, and, if I can avoid it, I'd rather not
modify the code too much. I have plenty programs that have similar code
which works fine.

The program is rather simple:

I have a line (the first one actually), that does:

var = gnome_config_get_float_with_default(path2, &def);

(path2 is "dds_control/dds/ref_clock=25.0", var is a double)

This produces the following error message (twice):

(dds_controller:6714): Gnome-CRITICAL **: gnome_program_locate_file:
assertion `program != NULL' failed

I ran this by gdb, with --g-fatal-errors, and get the following backtrace:

#0  IA__g_logv (log_domain=0x7f72fe9b66f0 "Gnome", log_level=G_LOG_LEVEL_CRITICAL, 
    format=0x7f7302858697 "%s: assertion `%s' failed",
    args1=0x7fff0ce478c0) at gmessages.c:512
#1  0x00007f7302805023 in IA__g_log (log_domain=0x7f73025b8a00 "", log_level=37256104, 
    format=0x51 <Address 0x51 out of bounds>) at gmessages.c:526
#2  0x00007f72fe9b1538 in gnome_program_locate_file (program=0x0, 
    domain=GNOME_FILE_DOMAIN_CONFIG, 
    file_name=0x65eaa0 "gnome/config-override/dds_control",
    only_if_exists=1, ret_locations=0x0) at gnome-program.c:911
#3  0x00007f72fe9adbaf in access_config_extended (mode=<value optimized out>, 
    section_name=0x65e91c "dds", key_name=0x65e920 "ref_clock",
    def=0x65e92a "25.0", rel_file=0x65e910 "dds_control",
    def_used=0x7fff0ce48bcc) at gnome-config.c:557
#4  0x00007f72fe9ae5aa in gnome_config_get_float_with_default_(path=<value optimized out>, 
    def=0x7fff0ce48bcc, priv=0) at gnome-config.c:1486
#5  0x00007f73025bf616 in load_by_table (fn=0x409ea0 "dds_control", 
    tbl=<value optimized out>, len=6, def_file=1) at confmgr.c:530
#6  0x000000000040360a in main (argc=1, argv=0x7fff0ce48cf8) at main.c:38

I see (#3) that the path is parsed correctly. #2 seems correct too, but then #1 seems to 
go wrong: 'format=0x51' is definitely wrong.

Can anyone suggest where to look? Google wasn't too helpful with the original
error message (only 10 hits).

John