I was using yum to update a server, then my putty session to the server dropped.

I reconnected, and now when i try to do a yum list updates, i get the following message:

Another app is currently holding the yum lock; waiting for it to exit...
The other application is: yum
Memory : 42 M RSS ( 53 MB VSZ)
Started: Fri Dec 3 12:05:30 2010 - 06:55 ago
State : Sleeping, pid: 21762

Does that mean its still installing the updates i asked it to, and i just need to wait for that to finish so i can see what updates are left? or am i really in a bad spot now?

No, it just means the lock file didn't get removed properly.

You can check if there's some yum process still going
If so kill it.

You'll get the pid # from the ps aux command above.

If not remove the yum pid file. As root

1 members found this post helpful.

Thanks. So how do i know its not still installing the updates i told it to before i got disconnected, because its in a "sleeping" state?

Nope. Since it is sleeping it's not instally anything. Indeed it was interrupted (actually it received a SIGHUP signal) from the broken connection. However the lock file of the running application is still there (check /var/run/yum.pid). You can kill the yum process whose PID is 21762 and remove the lock file /var/run/yum.pid if still there.

Edit: ooops... too late, reed9 gave the same answer before I actually did.

1 members found this post helpful.

Thanks guys. I killed the process like you both said, there was no pid file in that location, and now i can yum list updates. I was VERY scared for a while, thanks for the help you two.