Home ›

Using the Clone() System Call

Nov 08, 2000  By Joey Bernard
 in
Linux has introduced a new call, clone(), which allows a new level of process context creation.
About the Author

Joey Bernard is a self-described uber-geek. He has one degree in physics and is working on a second degree in computer science. He hopes to become a fully ordained priest of the Church of Tux. All donations will be accepted.

email: ljeditors@ssc.com

______________________

Joey Bernard has a background in both physics and computer science. This serves him well in his day job as a computational research consultant at the University of New Brunswick. He also teaches computational physics and parallel programming.

Comments

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.

nice article

saurabh_verma's picture
Submitted by saurabh_verma on Wed, 11/17/2010 - 07:15.

Good read .

I think when we use clone()

Jayashree K J's picture
Submitted by Jayashree K J (not verified) on Wed, 05/31/2006 - 01:28.

I think when we use clone() , it is a wrapper in C-library. Then after calling this wrapper , it in turn calls the actual clone(2) system call. If this is true then you have to mention it properly.
Looking for ur future & early updations, I remain.

Jayashree K J.
Bangalore ( NTPL ).
31st May, 2006.

How can Joey Bernard will be

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun, 03/19/2006 - 06:15.

How can Joey Bernard will be able to become a fully ordained priest of the Church of Tux, because his current profession is as a computer scientist ???????

How can Joey Bernard will be

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun, 03/19/2006 - 06:14.

How can Joey Bernard will be able to become a fully ordained priest of the Church of Tux, because his current profession is as a computer scientist ???????

Re: Using the Clone() System Call

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous on Tue, 08/31/2004 - 02:00.

WOW! i have been looking for manual for clone for weeeks!!! its been driving me up the wall!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! thankyou so much!!!

Leon

great article.

sathish's picture
Submitted by sathish (not verified) on Mon, 09/01/2008 - 06:40.

truely a good article.

Herr Fähnders, hier ist doch

IN-B3's picture
Submitted by IN-B3 (not verified) on Tue, 11/16/2004 - 11:05.

Herr Fähnders, hier ist doch alles auf Englisch! :(((((

Hier ist die Uebersetzung:

Translator's picture
Submitted by Translator (not verified) on Mon, 11/22/2004 - 15:57.

Hier ist die Uebersetzung:

http://babelfish.altavista.com/babelfish/trurl_pagecontent?url=http%3A%2...

Viel Spass beim Lesen

Re: Using the Clone() System Call

joeybernard's picture
Submitted by joeybernard (not verified) on Thu, 02/26/2004 - 03:00.

I've come back from the proverbial grave. While googling myself, I came across this verrry old article I had written. With more experience under my belt, I realize I was very stupid in parts of this article. I will be posting a link to an updated version here in the next few weeks if anyone who finds this article wants a corrected version.

Re: Using the Clone() System Call

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous on Mon, 10/11/2004 - 02:00.

Please do post an updated version. I found this article very helpful.

Re: Using the Clone() System Call

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous on Fri, 03/19/2004 - 03:00.

Hi
Kindly send me updated link
Please do the necessary changes u r mentioning

also can u mention some link i could use for clone()

I am a university student
Thanks
Vipul

u03138@cs.unipune.ernet.in

Re: Using the Clone() System Call

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 09/17/2003 - 02:00.

I was wondering why in the source code (listing 2) do you use a void **, when void * could very well be used for the child stack pointer

Rohit

Hey, the stack grows downwards!

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous on Mon, 10/28/2002 - 03:00.

Hi,

I'm Pablo, a humble reader from Argentina.

I found your article very interesting, however I couldn't run the code from figure 2. I did compiled it, but the execution of the clone call, lead to a segmentation fault.

I took a look at the clone's man page and it said that the you should pass a pointer to the stack pointer of the task, not the beginning of the stack.

So, as the stack decreases, and it's empty when the thread begins, the right address would not be child_stack, but child_stack + 65383.

Only that way the code runs fine.

Hope it helps.

Regarding child_stack of clone

vijay's picture
Submitted by vijay (not verified) on Wed, 04/29/2009 - 06:44.

How you are calculating as 65383.
How much should we need to allocate for malloc.
how to calculate malloc size.

Re: Hey, the stack grows downwards!

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 02/11/2004 - 03:00.

Well, it worked for me. I overlooked the -static option to cc the first time and got a segmentation fault.

Re: Hey, the stack grows downwards!

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous on Sun, 05/11/2003 - 02:00.

Using:

child_stack + 65383

still segments for me. Where does 65383
come in? 4 * 16384 -> 65536 anyhow!

child_stack + 4000

works for me i.e. address is a definitely safe
one to use.

David (djjohn@essex.ac.uk)

Re: Hey, the stack grows downwards!

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous on Tue, 07/08/2003 - 02:00.

You should write instead:

#define CHILD_STACK_SIZE 16384

clone( child_process, child_stack + CHILD_STACK_SIZE / sizeof( void ** ), CLONE_VM | CLONE_FILES, NULL );

Which is equivalent to CHILD_STACK_SIZE / 4 on most systems.

Re: Hey, the stack grows downwards!

Anonymous's picture
Submitted by Anonymous on Tue, 05/06/2003 - 02:00.

Hi I am manjeet,

even I faced the same problem (of segmentation fault) but

couldnt get out of it even after changing the child_stack pointer ...

Re: Using the Clone() System Call

Chupacabra's picture
Submitted by Chupacabra (not verified) on Tue, 10/16/2001 - 02:00.

I am Chupacabra! Fear my use of the Clone() System Call!

CNN.com

Webcast
More Resources
How to Build an Optimal Hadoop Cluster to Store and Maintain Unlimited Amounts of Data Using Microservers

Realizing the promise of Apache® Hadoop® requires the effective deployment of compute, memory, storage and networking to achieve optimal results. With its flexibility and multitude of options, it is easy to over or under provision the server infrastructure, resulting in poor performance and high TCO. Join us for an in depth, technical discussion with industry experts from leading Hadoop and server companies who will provide insights into the key considerations for designing and deploying an optimal Hadoop cluster.

Learn More

Sponsored by AMD

White Paper
More Resources
Private PaaS for the Agile Enterprise

If you already use virtualized infrastructure, you are well on your way to leveraging the power of the cloud. Virtualization offers the promise of limitless resources, but how do you manage that scalability when your DevOps team doesn’t scale? In today’s hypercompetitive markets, fast results can make a difference between leading the pack vs. obsolescence. Organizations need more benefits from cloud computing than just raw resources. They need agility, flexibility, convenience, ROI, and control.

Stackato private Platform-as-a-Service technology from ActiveState extends your private cloud infrastructure by creating a private PaaS to provide on-demand availability, flexibility, control, and ultimately, faster time-to-market for your enterprise.

Learn More

Sponsored by ActiveState