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20050504: gempak cleanup script error

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  • Subject: 20050504: gempak cleanup script error
  • Date: 04 May 2005 10:27:15 -0600
Gabe,

The program "gf" is the GEMPAK X-window based gif driver. This is not
a cleanup script.

If you have "gf" processes as well as "gplt" processes hanging around,
then either:
1) You are not running "gpend" to shut down the message queue and
   device driver.
2) Your cron or other program that is producing gifs is crashing 
   before getting to the "gpend" command.

The "cleanup" script in the gempak distribution will remove old message
queues, and gplt processes associated with such problems, but if the
problems are frequent, then you need to look at what scripts etc you 
have that are being run to generate the problem.

Since the "gf" driver uses an X server, you must have an X server
available to connect to using the DISPLAY environmental variable.
Verify that you aren't having problems related to that. If you are
running crons, then typically you would be running a virtual X server
(xvfb) to use to generate displays, or use the "gif" DEVICE in your
script which does not use the X server.

Steve Chiswell
Unidata User SUpport



On Wed, 2005-05-04 at 09:38, Gabe Langbauer wrote:
> Steve,
> 
> You may remember me asking about our crashing system here at Ohio State a
> few weeks ago...I've coninued to monitor the situation and it appears that
> what is occuring is that the cleanup script "hangs" and takes up 99% of
> the cpu for hours on end, until the whole system just crashes. 
> 
> I'm only guessing that it's the cleanup script, the command name is "gf"
> which could be anything...but the time it is occuring seems to relate with
> the time the cleanup script should be running.  I even changed the cron
> time of the cleanup script to test, and the time of the crashes changed
> accordingly.
> 
> Is there any "fixes" to the cleanup script that I may be missing?  Is
> there any reason you can think of that the cleanup script may hang like
> this?  Any other thoughts?
> 
> My system has the following characteristics:
> Dell Xeon dual-processors with RedHat v. 3
> Gempak 5.7.3
> 
> Any help would be greatly appreciated!
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Gabe Langbauer