Date: Wed, 18 Feb 2009 09:15:53 +0000 From: Anton Shterenlikht <mexas@bristol.ac.uk> To: Ian Smith <smithi@nimnet.asn.au> Cc: Anton Shterenlikht <mexas@bristol.ac.uk>, freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: w(5) shows non-existent or lost process? Message-ID: <20090218091553.GA74769@mech-cluster238.men.bris.ac.uk> In-Reply-To: <20090218175824.X38905@sola.nimnet.asn.au> References: <20090218013633.3309810656EC@hub.freebsd.org> <20090218175824.X38905@sola.nimnet.asn.au>
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On Wed, Feb 18, 2009 at 07:08:41PM +1100, Ian Smith wrote: > On Tue, 17 Feb 2009 13:43:30 +0000 Anton Shterenlikht <mexas@bristol.ac.uk> wrote: > > > The who (or w, or finger) command shows that I'm still logged into ttyp5, > > even though I have rebooted the <xxx> box many times since. Does this mean > > the corresponding entry in /var/run/utmp is wrong and shouldn't be there, or is there > > still some process attached to ttyp5? > > Certainly the former, given you've rebooted. I've had occasions when > utmp gets silly, though not for ages. Abrupt shutdown / power loss? > > > ouput of w: > > > > USER TTY FROM LOGIN@ IDLE WHAT > > mexas p4 <xxx> 1:32pm - w > > mexas p5 <xxx>:0. 26Jan09 21days - > > > > ps ax | grep ttyp5 > > shows no process > > ps would only list it as 'p5' anyway. > > 'w -d' may be a bit more informative: > > % w -d > 6:00PM up 68 days, 15:22, 1 user, load averages: 0.58, 0.23, 0.13 > USER TTY FROM LOGIN@ IDLE WHAT > 3733 login [pam] (login) > 3734 -csh (csh) > 7333 /bin/sh /usr/X11R6/bin/startx > 7351 /usr/X11R6/bin/xinit /home/smithi/.xinitrc -- -auth /home/smithi/.serverauth.7333 -nolisten tcp > 7352 X :0 -auth /home/smithi/.serverauth.7333 -nolisten tcp (Xorg) > 7356 /bin/sh /usr/local/bin/startkde > 7421 kwrapper ksmserver > smithi v7 - 12Dec08 68days /usr/X11R6/bin/xinit /home/smithi/.xinitrc -- -auth / > > > Looking at w(1) man page it seems that "-" in WHAT can be an indication > > that the process failed but not cleanly and that there could be some forked > > sub-process still alive. Does this make sense? Which other commands I can use > > to see what's going on? > > utmp(5) makes good bedtime reading :) > > /var/log/wtmp can get messed up sometimes too, especially if you're > logged in when periodic(8) monthly rotates it, but tools include: > > % last > smithi ttyp5 dolores Mon Feb 2 15:52 - 15:57 (00:05) > wtmp begins Mon Feb 2 15:52:27 EST 2009 > > !last -f /var/log/wtmp.0 > smithi ttyp5 rock.-----.org Mon Jan 26 19:37 - 23:17 (03:40) > smithi ttyp5 rock.-----.org Thu Jan 15 21:30 - 21:45 (00:14) > smithi ttyp5 rock.-----.org Thu Jan 15 18:04 - 18:05 (00:00) > smithi ttyp5 rock.-----.org Thu Jan 15 18:01 - 18:03 (00:01) > somebody ftp ww.xxx.yyy.zz Thu Jan 1 10:47 - 10:50 (00:03) > [..] > > % who > smithi ttyv7 Dec 12 02:39 > % who /var/log/wtmp.0 > [..] > somebody ftp61687 Jan 1 10:47 (ww.xxx.yyy.zz) > smithi ttyp5 Jan 15 18:01 (rock.-----.org) > smithi ttyp5 Jan 15 18:04 (rock.-----.org) > smithi ttyp5 Jan 15 21:30 (rock.-----.org) > smithi ttyp5 Jan 26 19:37 (rock.-----.org) > > % who am i > smithi ttyp4 Feb 18 18:16 > % tty > /dev/ttyp4 > > you could try opening enough xterms (ono) so your ttyp5 is used, then > exit them cleanly? Failing that, you can boot single user, mount /var, > rm /var/run/utmp, hit ^D (or reboot) .. IIRC I had to do that once; not > sure what happens if you rm /var/run/utmp while running multi-user! :) Ian, thank you. It's gone. Perhaps in the meantime I did log on to ttyp5 and exited cleanly. Thanks for the tips anyway. -- Anton Shterenlikht Room 2.6, Queen's Building Mech Eng Dept Bristol University University Walk, Bristol BS8 1TR, UK Tel: +44 (0)117 928 8233 Fax: +44 (0)117 929 4423
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