Strange output from ps

[Drew Corrigan]

We are experiencing an odd problem with 'ps' on our Sun hardware. We have
both Sun3 and Sun4 machines. All machines are running 4.1.1. When we do a 'ps aux' on the Sun3's we receive the following kind of output:

USER       PID %CPU %MEM   SZ  RSS TT STAT START  TIME COMMAND
root     17682 15.8  7.6  200  480 p1 R    12:23   0:00 ps aux
root     17683  7.9  3.9   56  248 p1 S    12:23   0:00 less
root         2  0.0  0.0    0    0 ?  D    May  8  0:21 pagedaemon
root       217  0.0  0.0   56    0 co IW   May  8  0:00 - std.9600 console (gettroot         1  0.0  0.8   56   48 ?  S    May  8  0:08 /sbin/init -
root       108  0.0  0.0   80    0 ?  IW   May  8  0:04 rpc.mountd -n
root        51  0.0  0.0   80    0 ?  IW   May  8  0:23 portmap
oracle     208  0.0  4.4  344  280 ?  S    May  8  0:09 ora_dbwr_a
bin         56  0.0  0.0   40    0 ?  IW   May  8  0:00 ypbind
root        54  0.0  3.0  168  192 ?  S    May  8 27:20 ypserv
root        60  0.0  0.0   56    0 ?  IW   May  8  0:00 keyserv
root        63  0.0  0.0   56    0 ?  IW   May  8  0:00 rpc.ypupdated
root        71  0.0  1.8   48  112 ?  S    May  8  4:09 in.routed
  ... etc ...

When we do the same on our Sun4's the output looks like this:

USER       PID %CPU %MEM   SZ  RSS TT STAT START  TIME COMMAND
root     23108 10.8  3.0  400  880 p0 R    12:25   0:00  (ps)
root     23109  7.7  1.5   88  440 p0 S    12:25   0:00  (less)
root     23104  1.0  2.6  136  752 p0 S    12:25   0:00  (csh)
root         2  0.0  0.0    0    0 ?  D    May  2  0:09 pagedaemon
root       242  0.0  0.0  192    0 ?  IW   May  2  0:39 /Compatibility/New_Frameroot         1  0.0  0.0  104    0 ?  IW   May  2  0:02  (init)
root     23023  0.0  0.0   80    0 co IW   11:13   0:00  (getty)
  ... etc ...
root       104  0.0  0.0   56    0 ?  S    May  2 25:24  (nfsd)
root       105  0.0  0.0   56    0 ?  S    May  2 25:10  (nfsd)
root        76  0.0  0.0   32    0 ?  S    May  2  0:07  (biod)
root       107  0.0  0.0   56    0 ?  S    May  2 25:10  (nfsd)
  ... etc ...
root       148  0.0  0.0  112    0 ?  IW   May  2  0:03  @ (cron)
root       123  0.0  0.0  104    0 ?  IW   May  2  0:00  (rpc.statd)
root       145  0.0  0.1   24   16 ?  S    May  2 19:21  (update)
root       130  0.0  0.0  216    0 ?  IW   May  2  3:31  (automount)
root       140  0.0  0.0  176    0 ?  IW   May  2  0:00  (saber_daemon2)
root       156  0.0  0.0  104    0 ?  IW   May  2  0:01 zA  Ku   U 7 u{ =Ab4>9  root     23055  0.0  0.0   48    0 ?  IW   11:54   0:01  (in.rlogind)
  ... etc ...
root     23062  0.0  0.0   96    0 p2 IW   11:55   0:00 [This file is ./DVIware/
jian     23102  0.0  0.0   32    0 p1 IW   12:23   0:00  (sleep)
root     13861  0.0  0.7   96  216 ?  S    May  7  3:46  (rpc.rstatd)
root     12838  0.0  0.0   96    0 ?  IW   May  6  0:03  (rpc.rquotad)
root     12737  0.0  0.3  104   80 ?  S    May  6  0:24  (inetd)
root     13835  0.0  0.0  208    0 ?  IW   May  7  0:44  (rpc.rquotad)
root     23063  0.0  0.0   96    0 p2 IW   11:55   0:00               K    " A  root     23103  0.0  1.7   48  512 ?  S    12:25   0:00  n     u (in.rlogind)
  ... etc ...

I've deliberately included a fair amount of the output for emphasis. All kinds
of weird things are listed. I have looked at our kernel configuration files,
but both sets of machines are running with pretty much the same configuration.
No aliases or other unexpected things are in effect.

Has anyone got any clues to what this might be? Email answers preferred as I
seldom read this group. 

Thanks in advance,


Drew Corrigan  (drew at anucsd.anu.edu.au)
---
Department of Computer Science, Australian National University