xref: /freebsd/usr.bin/protect/protect.1 (revision c8b6be0f7d1b92d11b279761685f61f6702700a1)

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.\" Written by: John H. Baldwin <jhb@FreeBSD.org>
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.Dd May 18, 2021
.Dt PROTECT 1
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm protect
.Nd "protect processes from being killed when swap space is exhausted"
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.Nm
.Op Fl i
.Ar command
.Nm
.Op Fl cdi
.Fl g Ar pgrp | Fl p Ar pid
.Sh DESCRIPTION
The
.Nm
command is used to mark processes as protected.
The kernel does not kill protected processes when swap space is exhausted.
Note that this protected state is not inherited by child processes by default.
.Pp
The options are:
.Bl -tag -width XXXXXXXXXX
.It Fl c
Remove protection from the specified processes.
.It Fl d
Apply the operation to all current children of the specified processes.
.It Fl i
Apply the operation to all future children of the specified processes.
.It Fl g Ar pgrp
Apply the operation to all processes in the specified process group.
.It Fl p Ar pid
Apply the operation to the specified process.
.It Ar command
Execute
.Ar command
as a protected process.
.El
.Pp
Note that only one of the
.Fl p
or
.Fl g
flags may be specified when adjusting the state of existing processes.
.Pp
Daemons can be protected on startup using
.Ao Ar name Ac Ns Va _oomprotect
option from
.Xr rc.conf 5 .
.Sh EXIT STATUS
.Ex -std
.Sh EXAMPLES
Mark the Xorg server as protected:
.Pp
.Dl "pgrep Xorg | xargs protect -p"
.Pp
Protect all ssh sessions and their child processes:
.Pp
.Dl "pgrep sshd | xargs protect -dip"
.Pp
Remove protection from all current and future processes:
.Pp
.Dl "protect -cdi -p 1"
.Pp
Using
.Xr ps 1
to check if the protect flag has been applied to the process:
.Pp
.Dl "ps -O flags,flags2 -p 64430"
.Pp
.Dl " PID        F       F2 TT  STAT    TIME COMMAND"
.Dl "64430 10104002 00000001  5  S+   0:00.00 ./main"
.Dl "        ^P            ^PI"
.Pp
In the above example
.Nm P
points at the protected flag and
.Nm PI
points at the iheritance flag.
The process is protected if
.Nm P
bit is set to 1. All children of this process will also be protected if
.Nm PI
bit is set to 1.
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr ps 1 ,
.Xr procctl 2 ,
.Xr rc.conf 5
.Sh BUGS
If you protect a runaway process that allocates all memory the system will
deadlock.