HELP!! (again) -- tar fs copy causes ps screwup

[Curtis Jackson]

In article <221 at drivax.UUCP> alan at drivax.UUCP (Alan Fargusson) writes:
>You might try tar(1), however you will have to fix it. If you have source
>that is. As in the example in the manual type:
>
>	cd fromdir; tar cf - . | ( cd todir; tar xf - )
>
>The problem with this is that when tar tries to make a directory in todir
>it execs mkdir(1), then waits for ALL of its children to complete. But in
>the bourne shell the first tar is a child of the second tar, so it can hang
>forever. All you have to do is fix tar(1) so it only waits for the process
>that it forked.

Perhaps one of you can help me with this one:  I did try tar (before I knew
of the problem mentioned above) to copy a filesystem, and it did hang, and
in the process every 'ps -f' (particularly 'ps -ef') I do from that day on
is SCREWED!!  It comes up with all sorts of strange processes with weird
start times and command-names that are random bits of text from the 'fromdir'
filesystem I was trying to tar.  I have tried rebooting with no success;
I have removed /etc/ps_data and let ps recreate it afresh with no success;
I am down now to going through ps with a fine-tooth sdb unless someone can
give me an answer as to where ps is getting this bogus data and how I can
fix it.

Thanks for ANY info re this problem,
-- 

The MAD Programmer -- 919-228-3313 (Cornet 291)
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