Pausing a running process to disk and continuing it later

[Mark Holcomb]

Wizards:

I've felt the need for need for a new tool that Sun doesn't have. 

Ever have a process that's been running for six weeks, and will 
need another week to finish when you need to make level 0 backups
or would like to shut the computer down for a bad storm.

I need a tool that would stop a running process and let it be 
restarted at a later date.

I've thought of a couple of ways it might be done:

1.  Processes that you know will run a long time might be run 
from a parent or with an other that periodically saves an image 
of the program.  If the machine is stopped, the job can be 
restarted from the last checkpoint. 

2.  Similarly, a signal could be sent to a process (like SIGINT)
which would stop the process and save a current image.  When you
wished, you could start the process again with a load and continue
to the process.

3.  Or you could have a ROLLOUT instruction instead of issuing a 
halt.  A "picture" of memory is taken (minus space needed to run
the process doing this).  At boot up, you would be given the option
of starting the machine where you stopped.



reply to:
		mth at rolf.stat.uga.edu		

on the internet, thanx.