Why am I having runaway cron processes that never go away?

[narnie]

Hello,

I have a test cron process going that has the follow result if I have MAILTO="":

root 1446 0.0 0.0 18708 996 ? Ss 18:48 0:00 cron
root 3631 0.0 0.0 91236 2188 ? S 18:56 0:00 \_ CRON
root 3632 0.0 0.0 91240 1264 ? S 18:56 0:00 | \_ CRON
woodnt 3633 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? Zs 18:56 0:00 | \_ [sh] <defunct>
root 3720 0.0 0.0 91236 2188 ? S 18:57 0:00 \_ CRON
root 3721 0.0 0.0 91240 1264 ? S 18:57 0:00 | \_ CRON
woodnt 3722 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? Zs 18:57 0:00 | \_ [sh] <defunct>
root 3752 0.0 0.0 91236 2188 ? S 18:58 0:00 \_ CRON
root 3753 0.0 0.0 91240 1264 ? S 18:58 0:00 | \_ CRON
woodnt 3754 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? Zs 18:58 0:00 | \_ [sh] <defunct>
root 3784 0.0 0.0 91236 2188 ? S 18:59 0:00 \_ CRON
root 3785 0.0 0.0 91240 1264 ? S 18:59 0:00 | \_ CRON
woodnt 3786 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? Zs 18:59 0:00 | \_ [sh] <defunct>
root 4155 0.0 0.0 91236 2188 ? S 19:11 0:00 \_ CRON
root 4156 0.0 0.0 91240 1264 ? S 19:11 0:00 | \_ CRON
woodnt 4157 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? Zs 19:11 0:00 | \_ [sh] <defunct>
root 4181 0.0 0.0 91236 2188 ? S 19:12 0:00 \_ CRON
root 4182 0.0 0.0 91240 1264 ? S 19:12 0:00 | \_ CRON
woodnt 4183 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? Zs 19:12 0:00 | \_ [sh] <defunct>
root 4209 0.0 0.0 91236 2188 ? S 19:13 0:00 \_ CRON
root 4210 0.0 0.0 91240 1264 ? S 19:13 0:00 | \_ CRON
woodnt 4211 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? Zs 19:13 0:00 | \_ [sh] <defunct>
root 4891 0.0 0.0 91236 2188 ? S 19:14 0:00 \_ CRON
root 4892 0.0 0.0 91240 1264 ? S 19:14 0:00 | \_ CRON
woodnt 4893 0.0 0.0 0 0 ? Zs 19:14 0:00 | \_ [sh] <defunct>
root 5469 0.0 0.0 91236 2188 ? S 19:15 0:00 \_ CRON


If MAILTO is not unset, I get:


root 14693 0.0 0.0 91236 1660 ? S Feb05 0:00 \_ CRON
root 14694 0.0 0.0 91244 1160 ? S Feb05 0:00 | \_ CRON
woodnt 14696 0.0 0.0 50152 2800 ? S Feb05 0:00 | \_ /usr/sbin/sendmail -i -FCronDaemon -oem woodnt

all accumulating.

The only way to remove them is by root killing, and some won't go away even with kill -9 (the defunct one of course)

I have an Ubuntu karmic box. Running the same thing on 2 other karmic boxs and an intrepid box and they DON'T do this.

I have bsd-mailx (depends postfix) installed for receiving the cron mails (thus sym-link sendmail to postfix).


$ uname -a
Linux toshiba-laptop 2.6.31-14-generic #48-Ubuntu SMP Fri Oct 16 14:05:01 UTC 2009 x86_64 GNU/Linux


The test crontab (no flames on running every minute, please):


MAILTO=""
#m h dom mon dow command
* * * * * /home/woodnt/bin/test_cron > /dev/null 2>&1



$ catprog test_cron
#! /bin/bash
#

# if ! type promptYesNo > /dev/null 2>&1 ; then . /home/woodnt/scripts/misc.sh ; fi

FILE=/tmp/cron.log
TIME=`date -d now "+%m-%d-%y@%H%M%S"`
if [ ! -f $FILE ] ; then
touch $FILE
fi

echo "Hello at $TIME" >> $FILE


Any clue what might be going on and how to fix it?

With thanks,
Narnie