[Gllug] Unkillable process

Alain Williams addw at phcomp.co.uk
Sat Jun 29 16:53:42 UTC 2002


On Sat, Jun 29, 2002 at 05:01:42PM +0100, Nix wrote:

> A process's userspace component (the thing we normally think of when we
> say `the process') has asked the kernel to do something on behalf of it
> for which the kernel has seen fit to mark the process as being
> non-killable until the kernel finishes fiddling with its data structures
> / releases a lock / whatever.  And then the kernel's got stuck (probably
> blocked on a lock left open by an earlier oops, or something like
> that). So it never got around to saying `OK, this process can be
> interrupted again', let alone to returning so that the process's
> userspace component can actually *do* anything.

Very often a problem in a device driver - ask the device to do something
which never completes - & no timeout has been set.

-- 
Alain Williams

#include <std_disclaimer.h>


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