From owner-freebsd-hackers  Wed May 21 22:31:24 1997
Return-Path: <owner-hackers>
Received: (from root@localhost)
          by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) id WAA02063
          for hackers-outgoing; Wed, 21 May 1997 22:31:24 -0700 (PDT)
Received: from bunyip.cc.uq.edu.au (daemon@bunyip.cc.uq.edu.au [130.102.2.1])
          by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.5/8.8.5) with ESMTP id WAA02056
          for <freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org>; Wed, 21 May 1997 22:31:18 -0700 (PDT)
Received: (from daemon@localhost)
	by bunyip.cc.uq.edu.au (8.8.5/8.8.5) id PAA06374
	for freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org; Thu, 22 May 1997 15:31:13 +1000
Received: from localhost.devetir.qld.gov.au by ogre.dtir.qld.gov.au (8.7.5/DEVETIR-E0.3a) with SMTP
	id PAA07067; Thu, 22 May 1997 15:18:19 +1000 (EST)
Message-Id: <199705220518.PAA07067@ogre.dtir.qld.gov.au>
To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org
cc: syssgm@dtir.qld.gov.au
Subject: Re: process monitoring tool (like SysV init)? 
References: <9705210854.AA02911@poveri.tekla.fi> <19970521203745.EU46231@uriah.heep.sax.de>
In-Reply-To: <19970521203745.EU46231@uriah.heep.sax.de>
    from J Wunsch at "Wed, 21 May 1997 18:37:45 +0000"
Date: Thu, 22 May 1997 15:18:18 +1000
From: Stephen McKay <syssgm@dtir.qld.gov.au>
Sender: owner-hackers@freebsd.org
X-Loop: FreeBSD.org
Precedence: bulk

On Wednesday, 21st May 1997, J Wunsch wrote:

>As Sakari Jalovaara wrote:
>
>> It struck me as a rather nice idea.  No more "ps | grep sendmail ...
>> kill ... sendmail -bd -q1h" - just do "nanny restart sendmail".
>
>All `conforming' daemons leave their PID in /var/run/<name>.pid.

/var/run/* is good, but not foolproof.  A daemon could die and not remove
its pid file.  An innocent bystander could be shot.  A nanny program (assuming
it doesn't die :-0 ) would know immediately if one of its children exited.

I like the idea of a nanny type program, but can't decide whether it should
be merged with init, much like System V, or kept separate like inetd.

Stephen.