[SOLVED] What is /httpd -k start -DSSL actually doing?

cnmoore · 12-09-2010, 12:14 PM

My googling doesn't get me anything useful.

Very simple question for you Linux experts:
What is /httpd -k start -DSSL actually doing?
I see a fair number of those lines in top.

Code:

  PID USER      PR  NI  VIRT  RES  SHR S %CPU %MEM    TIME+  COMMAND
13612 apache    16   0  167m  18m 4484 S  3.2  0.5   0:00.80 /usr/sbin/httpd -k start -DSSL
13588 apache    16   0  173m  23m 4472 R  2.3  0.6   0:01.84 /usr/sbin/httpd -k start -DSSL
13632 apache    16   0  166m  17m 4356 S  2.0  0.4   0:00.50 /usr/sbin/httpd -k start -DSSL

Is apache wiping out old idle threads, or what? Why do the different lines have different CPU% ? What is that -k ? does it mean 'kill'?

bathory · 12-09-2010, 12:29 PM

Hi,

This is the command used to start apache with SSL support.
Actually what you've posted are the apache child processes.
Read the man page for details

Regards

cnmoore · 12-09-2010, 01:11 PM

Thanks - already studied man page to no avail. What I mainly don't understand is the "-k". Can't find any info about httpd command line.

So what does -k do?

bathory · 12-09-2010, 01:22 PM

There is nothing strange with -k.
-k is an option that gets an extra argument. According to that argument it's used to start/stop/restart apache.
Basically httpd is not used to start apache. This is done with the wrapper script apachectl and the option used with apachectl is passed to httpd and used by the -k option. Thus if you run "apachectl start" you actually call "httpd -k start" and so on

Regards

cnmoore · 12-09-2010, 01:49 PM

Thank you very much. I never would have guessed - or found - that.