From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S932169AbVKFR5T (ORCPT ); Sun, 6 Nov 2005 12:57:19 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S932242AbVKFR5T (ORCPT ); Sun, 6 Nov 2005 12:57:19 -0500 Received: from shawidc-mo1.cg.shawcable.net ([24.71.223.10]:14499 "EHLO pd4mo1so.prod.shaw.ca") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S932169AbVKFR5S (ORCPT ); Sun, 6 Nov 2005 12:57:18 -0500 Date: Sun, 06 Nov 2005 11:57:14 -0600 From: Robert Hancock Subject: Re: Killing a process with a kernel module In-reply-to: <55vPd-6Ug-155@gated-at.bofh.it> To: linux-kernel Message-id: <436E43FA.1090409@shaw.ca> MIME-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit X-Accept-Language: en-us, en References: <55vPd-6Ug-155@gated-at.bofh.it> User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0.6 (Windows/20050716) Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Patrick Barnes wrote: > Hi there, > > RedHat recently released RHEL4 U2, and this update has some > unfortunate consequences, mainly > https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=170087 > > As stated in the bugzilla report above, useradd gets stuck in a R > state and ignores all signals. > > I have a critical system which I can't take down for another week or > so, but the extra load generated by the rogue useradd process is > slowing things down a little too much. > > I was wondering if it was possible to safely terminate the process > using a more direct method (perhaps by manipulating kernel data > structures.) > > What I'd like to know is if it is actually possible before attempting > to write the code to do it. > > I know this is a long shot, but it's probably worth trying. :) > > Thanks for your time. I look forward to any replies. If it's not responding to signals I wouldn't count on being able to do this safely. Can't you nice the process down to lowest priority? -- Robert Hancock Saskatoon, SK, Canada To email, remove "nospam" from hancockr@nospamshaw.ca Home Page: http://www.roberthancock.com/