Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!att!emory!gatech!prism!jb107 From: jb107@prism.gatech.EDU (Jim Burns) Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions Subject: Re: vfork() Message-ID: <24703@hydra.gatech.EDU> Date: 20 Mar 91 00:26:00 GMT References: <1991Mar19.181626.28739@dg-rtp.dg.com> Distribution: usa Organization: Georgia Institute of Technology Lines: 20 in article <1991Mar19.181626.28739@dg-rtp.dg.com>, hunt@dg-rtp.rtp.dg.com (Greg Hunt) says: > The vfork(2) system call does the same thing as the fork(2) system call > except that the child process shares the same address space as the > parent process, instead of having a complete copy of the parent's > address space made for it during the fork. It uses the same mechanism > as fork(2) to indicate which process is the child (the call returns > zero) and which process is the parent (the call returns the PID of the > child). The HP-UX man pages state that a particular implementation may make no distinction between fork(2) and vfork(2), and programs should not depend on vfork(2)'s distinctions. How true is this generally? If a vendor provides vfork(2), can it be expected to be different from fork(2), in the main? -- BURNS,JIM (returned student & GT Research Institute staff member) Georgia Institute of Technology, Georgia Tech Station 30178, Atlanta Georgia, 30332 | Internet: jb107@prism.gatech.edu uucp: ...!{decvax,hplabs,ncar,purdue,rutgers}!gatech!prism!jb107