dldd daemon/process and Visual Basic

[Rita C Workman]

Developers here are using Visual Basic to set up a Workflow system. They requested that I start the 'dldd' process. I did. I'm not real familiar with this process, so 1) I'm not sure how to stop it properly. And more importantly, I'm not sure what part of what I am seeing on this system performance is the result of this process.
I know this .. it uses maxdsiz value to assign the address for a shared library. But if the maxdsiz is too large...what is the result...? If it is too small...what is the result...? Of course, the developers (vendors) made no request to what they feel it should be-except less than 1gb. I'm hearing complaints of system performance; but I can't tell what part this process is causing....if anything. My system looks good to me-no swap errors....or anything telling me it's having a problem. Just users complaining. I feel it's on the PC with their application....they say it's the box and are pointing a finger now at the process they needed started.
Anybody had any experience with this process? Any comments or anything at this point would be appreciated....
Thanks,

[CHRIS_ANORUO]

Hi Rita,

ps -ef|grep dldd will show the process.
Maxdsiz at 1gb is good for a 10.20 box
Don't allow to push you around to start changing working parameters .

[Stefan Farrelly]

First we need to identify what the dldd process belongs to. I cant find it on any of our servers, it sounds like some extra application. If you do an> swlist -l file | grep dldd what does it return ? (Apart from filesets OS-Core and some Patches)

[Rita C Workman]

Thanks Chris & Stefan...
The process is used when they try to run their Workflow application. This is coded in Visual Basic and once they start it up...it grabs about 400+mb in virtual memory. The dldd process seems to just grab about 1.8mb. As near as I can tell this little process is just something that just seems to manage address spaces for their job to request a process that shares the vtables. <...boy don't I sound smart..> At least that's what I have managed to find out so far. And of course (as with many vendors...) when their job performs poorly......it must be the Operating System.
I run Glance + daily to monitor all the systems.....I have set my parm file so I could prove exactly what the process was doing. And I can't see anything wrong the box performance. .. To me it's a no brainer........look to your application.
(...and believe Chris....I've been around too long to be 'forced' into anything...so says my husband..haha)
But I would like to be able to control the process better .. at least? It's not like MWA where you just start/stop it.....I can't figure out how to stop it without rebooting the box.
I can't see how to identify it (the dldd queue) in ipcs? Any suggestions on this...

[Antoanetta Naghiu]

I'm not sure this help, but, from the way that you start the process should be a way to stop it. I suppose you don't have any additional script in /sbin/rc3.d. Probably you are using a command line. If you type just the name of the executable with -h (help) or -v option, are you getting anything? Or from the command line with no option, and if comes back with ddlll...> type help, or ? ... Should be a way... Do they ask you to start it as root?
The last thing, what happened if you kill it?
Actually can you kill it? Is the process under SIGKILL interval (it is a priority interval where a specific process can not be reachble by any signal).
To use ipcs, you can try to run it as ipcs -m (for displaying info about shared memory segments, -q for queues and -s for semaphors.
To kill it use ipcrm. (see man ipcs, man ipcrm).

[Rita C Workman]

Hi Antoanetta,
I did start it via the command line...although I now know there is ~/vwrestart that is the more preferred method. Ignore that they call it vw restart..
When I tried to stop the process I did sigterm kill -15...and it just hung forever. So I tried the sigkill -9 option. And it still stays out there.
The information I have managed to find under man page has helped me have a better understanding <..I use this term loosely..>.
The dldd daemon is a background process that under ipcs shows up as a queue. But to identify which queue....I couldn't do it. And it would not be wise to just go killing off queues blindly......so therein lays my problem.
I can't find anything to tell me the command to properly stop the process. I have learned DON'T do sigkill....it doesn't work right for this.
So now I have a process running.....I am unable to identify it in ipcs -q....and I know that I dare not attempt to start another (this is a no no...) So, my only alternative seems to be to reboot the box. And with 6 processors, and over 1000 users...that's alot of lost production on a box doing other things...
Just once...I'd like a nice quiet week...when I could read my technical magazines and just monitor things......But then I wake up !!
If you have any more suggestions....let me know....and Thanks for the Help !

[Antoanetta Naghiu]

Can you start this as a ... let's say, vw user? If yes, in the ipcs -q will be able to identify the process by owner... Who is owner of the application itself? I learn once, the apps should have another owner than root, and many times after I convinss myself it is a good idea. If the requirement is to start it as root,... sorry, no more idea.

[Rita C Workman]

It is started as root....and therein I think is the 'root' of the problem....can not distinguish the queue based on this...
ARGHGHHGHGH.....and it's Friday !!!

Thanks again for your help.....looks like this little daemon...is gonna be a little demon.

[CHRIS_ANORUO · Accepted solution]

Hi Rita

You can use ipcs -mob or ipcs -mobs to check the shared memory and semophore ids of the running processes.
The kill or stop the processes use ipcrm -s for semophores -m for shared memory and then the is.
Eg ipcrm -m 4434 to terminate (kill) a shared memory process.
ipcrm -s 13656 to terminate a semophore process.
Terminated processes can be seen with ipcs -t (OTIME=no-entry)
Have a nice weekend and don't allow them to beat you to it.

Cheers!

[Rita C Workman]

Thank you all for your help....even though some things 'fix' my needs....It sure was information... !!!!

Regards