'who' command incorrectly reporting?

elliot01 · 11-04-2010, 01:01 PM

SERVER INFO:
[root@bml pts]# uname -a
Linux bml.xxx.co.uk 2.4.18-6mdk #1 Fri Mar 15 02:59:08 CET 2002 i686 unknown

Hi all,

Can someone explain exactly how 'who' builds its user list?

I have a problem where it's listing a user on my server, but I can not kill them.

# [root@bml pts]# who | sort
...
simons pts/52 Nov 2 12:33 (derby1)
...

# [root@bml pts]# ps -ef | grep simons
root 6199 3049 0 17:47 pts/0 00:00:00 grep simons

# [root@bml pts]# ps -ef | grep pts/52
root 6391 3049 0 17:48 pts/0 00:00:00 grep pts/52

This user appears to have no processes running, yet who is listing them. How can I remove them from the 'who' list?

Thanks in advance.

Tinkster · 11-04-2010, 11:19 PM

What does

Code:

lsof | grep "pts/52"

tell you?

elliot01 · 11-05-2010, 06:20 AM

Ah damn, some other techie decided to reboot the server to fix the problem (!) so I can't follow it up (until it maybe happens again!).

Out of interest though, I tried that command but it doesn't look like this version of linux supports it:

Code:

[root@bml root]# lsof | grep "pts/20"
bash: lsof: command not found
[root@bml root]# man lsof
No manual entry for lsof
[root@bml root]#

Thanks for your assistance anyway

Tinkster · 11-05-2010, 02:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by elliot01

Ah damn, some other techie decided to reboot the server to fix the problem (!) so I can't follow it up (until it maybe happens again!).

Out of interest though, I tried that command but it doesn't look like this version of linux supports it:

Code:

[root@bml root]# lsof | grep "pts/20"
bash: lsof: command not found
[root@bml root]# man lsof
No manual entry for lsof
[root@bml root]#

Thanks for your assistance anyway

You'd probably just need to install the package, I'm
fairly certain that Mandrake supplies a package for it,
it's such a frequently used tool ...

Cheers,
Tink