Re: When kill fails...
Svanberg Liss <lisss@ydab.se> writes:
> Uhmmm....
> I might have missed something in all UNIX - related manuals I have seen,
> but...
>
> if
> # kill -9 <some pid>
> fails for a program (that has hung) , what should I do then...
>
> Does there exist any kommand, or call, UNIX specific, HURD specific, or Mach
> specific - that completely and unfrendly removes a program from the
> tasklist, and whipes it out of the virtual memory?
Unless the task is in an unpredictable and dangerous state it will
allways be killed.
If a task hangs in the kernel (e.g. takes ages in one of those
routines that never take more than a few cycles), you cannot remove
the task without risking kernel structures, so the kernel normaly
waits till the task leaves the kernel and removes it then.
This should NEVER happen but happens frequently under linux. Under
Hurd I would think it very unlikely to happen, since hardly anything
runs in kernel mode.
May the Source be with you.
Goswin
PS: Don´t worry about wasted memory by such processes, it gets swapped
out and you should have plenty of swap.
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