Correction, the file "charset.alias" is only installed for groff for glibc < 2.1 . The code that reads charset.alias is always created. What could possibly go wrong? Anyway, I suggest the following minimal patch: diff --git a/gnu/packages/groff.scm b/gnu/packages/groff.scm index 77728a5d7..ee2896367 100644 --- a/gnu/packages/groff.scm +++ b/gnu/packages/groff.scm @@ -62,6 +62,16 @@ `(#:parallel-build? #f ; parallel build fails #:phases (modify-phases %standard-phases + (add-after 'unpack 'disable-relocatability + (lambda _ + (substitute* "src/libs/libgroff/Makefile.sub" + (("-DENABLE_RELOCATABLE=1") "")) + ;; That file contains a crash bug--so make sure that + ;; its contents are not there. + (call-with-output-file "src/libs/libgroff/relocate.cpp" + (lambda (port) + #t)) + #t)) (add-after 'unpack 'setenv (lambda _ (setenv "GS_GENERATE_UUIDS" "0") I filed an upstream bug report: https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/index.php?55475