[ILUG] Sendmail error in Mandrake killing the box

[Dermot Beirne]

Hi,
I have a CVS server running on Mandrake 7.1 at work, and it is starting to
run unworkably slow a few weeks ago.   After investigation I have found the
following sendmail processes running on the machine that is killing its
performance.

Here is an extract of the ps-eaf|grep sendmail command

root      2339  2324  0 04:02 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2418  2391  0 05:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2466  2439  0 06:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2512  2485  0 07:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2558  2531  0 08:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2606  2579  0 09:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2657  2630  0 10:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2709  2682  0 11:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2770  2743  0 12:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2816  2789  0 13:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2894  2867  0 14:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2940  2913  0 15:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon
root      2991  2962  0 16:01 ?        00:00:00 /usr/sbin/sendmail
-FCronDaemon

I am finding it surprisingly difficult to find any useful information on
this error while googling the net, and was hoping that someone here has
been through the mill with this error already.

There are hundreds of the above processes, and they are continuing to grow
all the time.  I have stopped everything that I felt was related to it, and
it sure enough it stayed away for a few weeks, but now it's back today, and
the machine is dying again.

Does anyone recognise where it may be coming from, or what in sendmail is
causing it.
Many thanks in advance,
Dermot.



______________________________________________________________________
Important Email Information