checkrestart(1)                 debian-goodies                 checkrestart(1)

NAME
       checkrestart  -  check  which  processes  need to be restarted after an
       upgrade

SYNOPSIS
       checkrestart [ -hvpa ] [ -b blacklist_file ] [ -i package_name ]

DESCRIPTION
       The checkrestart program tries to determine if there are  processes  in
       the  system  that  need to be restarted after a system upgrade. This is
       necessary since an upgrade will usually bring new system libraries  and
       running  processes  will  be  still  using  the  old  versions  of  the
       libraries. In stable Debian GNU/Linux systems this is typically  needed
       to eliminate a system exposure to a vulnerability which might have been
       fixed by upgrading a library which that process makes use of.

       Consequently, checkrestart is sometimes used as an audit tool  to  find
       outdated  versions  of  libraries  in  use, particularly after security
       upgrades. Administrators should not, however, rely on its  output  com-
       pletely (see BUGS below).

       This  script needs to run as root in order to obtain the information it
       needs for analysis.

OPTIONS
       -h,--help
              Show the program help and exit.

       -v,--verbose
              Generate detailed output. This output includes the list  of  all
              processes  found  using  deleted files or descriptors as well as
              the deleted files and descriptors found.

       -p,--package
              Only process deleted files that belong to  a  package,  ignoring
              deleted  files  which  do  not have an associated package in the
              package system.

       -a,--all
              Process all deleted files regardless of location. This makes the
              program  analyse  deleted  files even if they would be discarded
              because they are located in locations, such as /tmp , which  are
              known  to produce false positives. It will take preceded if used
              simultaneously with the -p option.

       -b file,--blacklist=file
              Read a blacklist of regular expressions from  file.   Any  files
              matching the patterns will be ignored.

       -i name,--ignore=name
              Ignore services that are associated to the package name provided
              in name.

EXIT STATUS
       The program will exit with error (1) if a non-root user  tries  to  run
       it. Otherwise, it will always exit with error status 0.

EXAMPLE
       Start it as user root without parameters:

         # checkrestart
         Found 20 processes using old versions of upgraded files
         (15 distinct programs)
         (14 distinct packages)

         Of  these,  12  seem  to  contain  init  scripts which can be used to
       restart them:
         The following packages seem to have init scripts that could  be  used
       to restart them:
         gpm:
                 3044    /usr/sbin/gpm
         rpcbind:
                 2208    /sbin/rpcbind
         bind9:
                 8463    /usr/sbin/named
         openssh-server:
                 22124   /usr/sbin/sshd
         ntp:
                 4078    /usr/sbin/ntpd
         tftpd-hpa:
                 3417    /usr/sbin/in.tftpd
         uptimed:
                 2704    /usr/sbin/uptimed
         cron:
                 3019    /usr/sbin/cron
         postfix:
                 22145   /usr/lib/postfix/qmgr
                 8892    /usr/lib/postfix/master
         hddtemp:
                 3174    /usr/sbin/hddtemp
         autofs:
                 2792    /usr/sbin/automount
         openbsd-inetd:
                 3254    /usr/sbin/inetd

         These are the init scripts:
         service gpm restart
         service rpcbind restart
         service bind9 restart
         service ssh restart
         service ntp restart
         service tftpd-hpa restart
         service uptimed restart
         service cron restart
         service postfix restart
         service hddtemp restart
         service autofs restart
         service openbsd-inetd restart

         These  processes  do  not  seem  to have an associated init script to
       restart them:
         isc-dhcp-client:
                 3775    /sbin/dhclient

BUGS
       This program might fail if the output of the lsof utility changes since
       it  depends  on it to detect which deleted files are used by processes.
       It might also output some false positives depending on  the  processes'
       behaviour since it does not check yet if the (deleted) files in use are
       really libraries.

       If you find a false positive in checkrestart please provide the follow-
       ing information when submitting a bug report:

       --     The output of checkrestart using the -v (verbose) option.

       --     The output of running the following command as root:

               lsof | egrep 'delete|DEL|path inode'

       Checkrestart  is also sensitive to the kernel version in use. And might
       fail to work with newer (or older) versions.

       A rewrite to make it less dependent on lsof could  improve  this,  how-
       ever.

SEE ALSO
       lsof(8)

AUTHOR
       checkrestart  was  written  by  Matt Zimmerman for the Debian GNU/Linux
       distribution.

COPYRIGHT AND LICENCE
       Copyright  (C)  2001  Matt  Zimmerman  <mdz@debian.org>  Copyright  (C)
       2007,2010-2011 Javier Fernandez-Sanguino <jfs@debian.org>

       This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
       under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published  by  the
       Free  Software  Foundation;  either  version 2, or (at your option) any
       later version.

       On Debian systems, a copy of the GNU  General  Public  License  may  be
       found in /usr/share/common-licenses/GPL.

debian-goodies                 December 19 2006                checkrestart(1)