2000-12-08 02:56:15

by Zhiruo Cao

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: who is writing to disk


Hello,

I found a process constantly writing to disk when I run gnome as desktop
and while the whole system is idle. I don't find anything in the log
file, and I don't see anything updated in my home dir or in /tmp. Does it
sound like bdflush is writing? But I don't hear the disk access when I
am not running gnome.

My question then is, is there a (monitoring) tool that can tell me who is
writing to disk? Or how I configure the kernel to know that?

Thanks!

Joe


2000-12-08 09:00:53

by Richard J Moore

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Subject: Re: who is writing to disk



One option, if there's no bespoke mechanism is to use DPorbes and or Linux
Trace Toolkit to set up a trace of file system apis. You could also start
with strace.


Richard Moore - RAS Project Lead - Linux Technology Centre (PISC).

http://oss.software.ibm.com/developerworks/opensource/linux
Office: (+44) (0)1962-817072, Mobile: (+44) (0)7768-298183
IBM UK Ltd, MP135 Galileo Centre, Hursley Park, Winchester, SO21 2JN, UK


Zhiruo Cao <[email protected]> on 08/12/2000 02:25:03

Please respond to Zhiruo Cao <[email protected]>

To: [email protected]
cc: [email protected]
Subject: who is writing to disk





Hello,

I found a process constantly writing to disk when I run gnome as desktop
and while the whole system is idle. I don't find anything in the log
file, and I don't see anything updated in my home dir or in /tmp. Does it
sound like bdflush is writing? But I don't hear the disk access when I
am not running gnome.

My question then is, is there a (monitoring) tool that can tell me who is
writing to disk? Or how I configure the kernel to know that?

Thanks!

Joe

2000-12-08 14:19:41

by Alan

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: who is writing to disk

> My question then is, is there a (monitoring) tool that can tell me who is
> writing to disk? Or how I configure the kernel to know that?

Monitoring tool - none that I know of. FInd can do a search and find all very
new files.

Most likely it's a combination of cruddy CD-ROM drives and magicdev. See
if /var/log/messages has an ever growing rant from the cdrom drive


2000-12-10 21:52:55

by Pavel Machek

[permalink] [raw]
Subject: Re: who is writing to disk

Hi!

> I found a process constantly writing to disk when I run gnome as desktop
> and while the whole system is idle. I don't find anything in the log
> file, and I don't see anything updated in my home dir or in /tmp. Does it
> sound like bdflush is writing? But I don't hear the disk access when I
> am not running gnome.
>
> My question then is, is there a (monitoring) tool that can tell me who is
> writing to disk? Or how I configure the kernel to know that?

Access time updates? Try mounting with noatime.
Pavel

--
I'm [email protected]. "In my country we have almost anarchy and I don't care."
Panos Katsaloulis describing me w.r.t. patents at [email protected]