I've just fixed code in a test that ignored virInitialize failure. Looking at all uses, I saw one other: in python/libvirt-override.c, where the initialization function ignores virInitialize failure: void #ifndef __CYGWIN__ initlibvirtmod #else initcygvirtmod #endif (void) { static int initialized = 0; if (initialized != 0) return; virInitialize(); /* initialize the python extension module */ Py_InitModule((char *) #ifndef __CYGWIN__ "libvirtmod" #else "cygvirtmod" #endif , libvirtMethods); initialized = 1; } Unfortunately, this function is public, so we can't change its signature. Any suggestions? For reference, here's the function definition. It shows that there are many ways in which virInitialize can fail, including its many registration functions: /** * virInitialize: * * Initialize the library. It's better to call this routine at startup * in multithreaded applications to avoid potential race when initializing * the library. * * Returns 0 in case of success, -1 in case of error */ int virInitialize(void) { if (initialized) return(0); initialized = 1; if (virThreadInitialize() < 0 || virErrorInitialize() < 0 || virRandomInitialize(time(NULL) ^ getpid())) return -1; gcry_control(GCRYCTL_SET_THREAD_CBS, &virTLSThreadImpl); gcry_check_version(NULL); virLogSetFromEnv(); DEBUG0("register drivers"); #if HAVE_WINSOCK2_H if (winsock_init () == -1) return -1; #endif if (!bindtextdomain(GETTEXT_PACKAGE, LOCALEBASEDIR)) return (-1); /* * Note that the order is important: the first ones have a higher * priority when calling virConnectOpen. */ #ifdef WITH_DRIVER_MODULES /* We don't care if any of these fail, because the whole point * is to allow users to only install modules they want to use. * If they try to open a connection for a module that * is not loaded they'll get a suitable error at that point */ virDriverLoadModule("test"); virDriverLoadModule("xen"); virDriverLoadModule("openvz"); virDriverLoadModule("vbox"); virDriverLoadModule("esx"); virDriverLoadModule("xenapi"); virDriverLoadModule("remote"); #else # ifdef WITH_TEST if (testRegister() == -1) return -1; # endif # ifdef WITH_XEN if (xenRegister () == -1) return -1; # endif # ifdef WITH_OPENVZ if (openvzRegister() == -1) return -1; # endif # ifdef WITH_PHYP if (phypRegister() == -1) return -1; # endif # ifdef WITH_VBOX if (vboxRegister() == -1) return -1; # endif # ifdef WITH_ESX if (esxRegister() == -1) return -1; # endif # ifdef WITH_XENAPI if (xenapiRegister() == -1) return -1; # endif # ifdef WITH_REMOTE if (remoteRegister () == -1) return -1; # endif #endif return(0); }