who -u | grep "user" listing dead prcesses?

[niranjan_9]

Hi,
Does
who -u | grep "user" give dead process ??

B-coz when I tried to kill (-9) this process, it says "kill: 20634: The specified process does not exist."

Any help ??

[KapilRaj]

The user is logged out by the time u try to kill it

Kaps

[Chris Wilshaw · Accepted solution]

This will be due to an old entry in the utmp or wtmp file. It happens quite often and is nothing to worry about.

These phantom sessions will stay around unless you either null the files, or reboot the system.