True. But a Zombie process which is also hung on I/O may never go away without a reboot. I have seen this with failed hardware monitoring software.
Anybody got an example to post?
It is important that we do not confuse Orphan processes (where the parent has failed) with a Zombie processes.
Finding Zombie processes depends on what version of "ps" your have.
For example:
This piece of code is crude and dangerous (and it doesn't work):
Quote:
3. Do this command to find the parent ID that relates to the zombie and then kill it:
# ps aux -eo ppid| grep <Zombie Process ID>
# kill -9 <PPID>
Use the "ps -p" switch to look up the parent process ID.
Then look carefully at the process before considering killing the process using the correct kill signal for that process (which is unlikely to be "-9"). Also do not kill init (PID 1).
One way to cause Zombie processes and other horrors is indiscriminate use of "kill -9".
My daemon process is the child of init and init has the responsibility to remove it, once it turns zombie. But I want to ask why the daemon process which is child of init turns zombie in the first place. What measures I have to take to avoid this?
rish (1 Reply)
I have RHES4 machine with VRTSralus - Backup Exec agent installed there and running as a service. The agent hiccups sometimes and turns into defunct state. The problem is that I cannot kill it anyway., it stays there forever until the machine is rebooted. I wonder if anyone had such an experience... (1 Reply)
Hi
I need help because I don't know if it is possible to add a find inside a cat.
like I have a file with the pid of the process that use to became zombie. And I have the same pid stored in the var (pid1)
now, I have no clue how to check if the the find finds the pid or even if it's... (2 Replies)
dear friends,
in an interview they asked me what is zombie process. how we can identifying these process.if can you kill all zombie process. (8 Replies)
Is there an equivilant to the preap command in AIX that would allow me to get rid of a zombie process. I am new to AIX, moving over from Solaris and in the past I have been able to preap the pid on the defunct process to clean them up. I have looked around and the best I can see is that it may... (3 Replies)
Dear Bos,
I have one server,everday if I check with command TOP always present zombie,like below:
last pid: 4578; load averages: 0.15, 0.11, 0.13 07:56:15
298 processes: 295 sleeping, 1... (10 Replies)
What is the overhead associated with zombie process?Is it running out of process-ID?:confused:
Since some information is stored in process table..
Thanks in Advance (4 Replies)
Discussion started by: jois
4 Replies
LEARN ABOUT FREEBSD
kill
KILL(1) BSD General Commands Manual KILL(1)NAME
kill -- terminate or signal a process
SYNOPSIS
kill [-s signal_name] pid ...
kill -l [exit_status]
kill -signal_name pid ...
kill -signal_number pid ...
DESCRIPTION
The kill utility sends a signal to the processes specified by the pid operands.
Only the super-user may send signals to other users' processes.
The options are as follows:
-s signal_name
A symbolic signal name specifying the signal to be sent instead of the default TERM.
-l [exit_status]
If no operand is given, list the signal names; otherwise, write the signal name corresponding to exit_status.
-signal_name
A symbolic signal name specifying the signal to be sent instead of the default TERM.
-signal_number
A non-negative decimal integer, specifying the signal to be sent instead of the default TERM.
The following PIDs have special meanings:
-1 If superuser, broadcast the signal to all processes; otherwise broadcast to all processes belonging to the user.
Some of the more commonly used signals:
1 HUP (hang up)
2 INT (interrupt)
3 QUIT (quit)
6 ABRT (abort)
9 KILL (non-catchable, non-ignorable kill)
14 ALRM (alarm clock)
15 TERM (software termination signal)
Some shells may provide a builtin kill command which is similar or identical to this utility. Consult the builtin(1) manual page.
EXIT STATUS
The kill utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.
EXAMPLES
Terminate the processes with PIDs 142 and 157:
kill 142 157
Send the hangup signal (SIGHUP) to the process with PID 507:
kill -s HUP 507
Terminate the process group with PGID 117:
kill -- -117
SEE ALSO builtin(1), csh(1), killall(1), ps(1), sh(1), kill(2), sigaction(2)STANDARDS
The kill utility is expected to be IEEE Std 1003.2 (``POSIX.2'') compatible.
HISTORY
A kill command appeared in Version 3 AT&T UNIX.
BUGS
A replacement for the command ``kill 0'' for csh(1) users should be provided.
BSD April 28, 1995 BSD