Stopping/killing jobs

• Article Type: General
• Product: Aleph
• Product Version: 19.01

Description:
Is there a safe way to stop a job once it has begun?

Resolution:
Killing jobs is a unix system function and you should consult your unix system administrator for whatever local policies you might have. That said, we can offer these guidelines: There are ALEPH utilities for stopping servers (util w), daemons (util e), and the batch queue (util c). If these don't work, you may need to kill the underlying process in a fashion similar to what we describe below. There is no utility for stopping a batch job.

You need to use the unix "kill" command. First, you should be certain that the job really needs to be killed. To locate the processes associated with the job, you enter a command like this:

ps -ef | grep manage_01 . (Note: some systems may require tick-marks:

ps -ef | grep 'manage_01' )

You should *not* include the "p_" prefix.

Then you do a kill command for each process. The process number you enter in is the *first* number in the line. You can include multiple processes in a single kill command. Your grep process will show up in the display. You don't want or need to kill that.

So, let's say you see this:

aleph 7207 7178 0 11:37:24 pts/7 0:00 grep manage_01
aleph 8651 7730 0 00:55:28 ? 0:00 csh -f p_manage_01_a VCU01,1,0000 00000,999999999,,4, p_manage_01 3
aleph 7730 7729 0 00:54:42 ? 0:00 csh -f /exlibris/a50_5/aleph/proc /p_manage_01 VCU01,1,000000000,999999999,,4,
aleph 19001 8595 21 08:36:54 ? 137:51 /exlibris/a50_5/aleph/exe/rts32 b_manage_01_a

You would enter in: kill -1 8651 7730 19001

Then do the "ps -ef | grep" to verify they are gone. If not, repeat the process using "kill -9" instead: kill -9 7730 19001

*When you kill a job like this, it will leave the library locked. Before restarting the job you will need to use util c/6 to unlock the library.

The above sequence should be enough. The kill -1 (or -9) should kill all subsidiary processes which were spawned. As a double-check you can look for tables this job might be loading: ps -ef | grep -i z9 or ps -ef | grep -i z0