Microsoft KB Archive/841898

= FIX: You cannot create more processes when many Win32 processes are called from Interix =

Article ID: 841898

Article Last Modified on 11/15/2007

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Windows Services for UNIX 3.5
 * Microsoft Windows Services for UNIX 3.0 Standard Edition

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SYMPTOMS
Child processes that call an exec function on a Microsoft Win32-based binary executable file remain as zombie processes and consume process slots. Therefore, the Microsoft Interix subsystem eventually runs out of process slots and does not let new processes create.

In particular, the tcsh command shell does not succeed while it tries to create many pipes to Win32 processes. Additionally, you may receive the following error message:

No more processes

Note This problem occurs only with Win32-executable files. This problem does not occur with equivalent Interix-executable files.



Hotfix information
A supported hotfix is now available from Microsoft. However, this hotfix is intended to correct only the problem that this article describes. Apply this hotfix only to systems that are experiencing this specific problem.

To resolve this problem, submit a request to Microsoft Online Customer Services to obtain the hotfix. To submit an online request to obtain the hotfix, visit the following Microsoft Web site:

http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=6294451

Note If additional issues occur or any troubleshooting is required, you might have to create a separate service request. The usual support costs will apply to additional support questions and issues that do not qualify for this specific hotfix. To create a separate service request, visit the following Microsoft Web site:

http://support.microsoft.com/contactus/?ws=support

Prerequisites
No prerequisites are required.

Restart requirement
You must restart your computer after you apply this hotfix.

File information
The English version of this hotfix has the file attributes (or later) that are listed in the following table. The dates and times for these files are listed in coordinated universal time (UTC). When you view the file information, it is converted to local time. To find the difference between UTC and local time, use the Time Zone tab in the Date and Time tool in Control Panel.   Date         Time   Version            Size    File name --  07-May-2004  01:46  8.0.1969.6        763,904  Psxss.exe



WORKAROUND
The Korn shell seems to be less vulnerable to this problem than the C shell because of the way that the Korn shell forks processes. Therefore, a workaround for C shell scripts is to convert them to Korn shell scripts.



STATUS
Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the &quot;Applies to&quot; section.



Sample code
The following sample code demonstrates this problem. Compile the Test1.c code as a Windows executable, and then run the Test.csh code.

Test1.c code
/* test1.c */ int main(int argc, char* argv[]) { int c;  while( ( c = getchar) != EOF ) putchar( c ) ; return 0 ; }
 * 1) include 

Test.csh code
while ( 1 ) set RESULT = `printf &quot;a b c&quot; | ./test1.exe` echo $RESULT end
 * 1) !/bin/csh
 * 2) test.csh
 * 1) test.csh

Additional query words: pipe ksh csh tcsh zombie

Keywords: kbqfe kbfix kbbug kbhotfixserver KB841898

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