What's eating the machine

[Bill Gradwohl]

I'm running a script to create and modify characteristics for about 80 
users on a new box. Normally the script would finish in a few seconds. 
So far its run for over an hour.

Below is the top output that shows memory utilization for usermod at 
95.3%. How is that possible on a box with 1Gig of RAM and 2Gig of swap? 
I've seen CPU% hit and stay at 90+% for quite a while on useradd and 
usermod.

The script (1400 lines long) is processing each line at an incredibly 
slow pace, so I believe what top is reporting, but can't fathom how this 
is possible.

Ideas anyone?

top - 16:51:00 up 23:51,  3 users,  load average: 2.17, 1.96, 1.86
Tasks:  56 total,   1 running,  55 sleeping,   0 stopped,   0 zombie
Cpu(s):  1.3% us,  5.0% sy,  0.0% ni,  0.0% id, 93.4% wa,  0.3% hi,  0.0% si
Mem:   1035980k total,  1029772k used,     6208k free,     1084k buffers
Swap:  2032212k total,  1021100k used,  1011112k free,     3556k cached

  PID USER      PR  NI  VIRT  RES  SHR S %CPU %MEM    TIME+  COMMAND
 5755 root      18   0 1401m 964m  308 D  3.3 95.3   0:18.65 usermod
  177 root      15   0     0    0    0 S  2.3  0.0   1:32.82 kswapd0

If anyone's interested, here's a typical sample of the script for 1 user:

#### vickie
if ! userexists vickie; then
   if ! gidexists 542 vickie; then
      if ! groupadd -g 542 vickie; then
         echo groupadd for 542 vickie failed.
         exit 1
      fi
   fi
   if gidexists 542 vickie; then
      if ! /usr/sbin/useradd -u 541 -g 542 -d /home/vickie -s /bin/bash 
-c 'vickie moreland    ' vickie; then
         echo useradd for user 541 vickie failed.
         exit 1
      fi
   else
      echo useradd for 541 vickie not attempted due to gid non existence.
      exit 1
   fi
else
   echo LoginID vickie already exists on this box. Skipping this user.
fi
if ! /usr/sbin/usermod -G sambashare,vickie vickie; then
   echo usermod -G sambashare,vickie vickie failed.
   exit 1
fi
if ! /usr/sbin/usermod -p '$1$Hs.U04hM$mCGAFBZt3mtALN46hiyU91' vickie; then
   echo usermod -p for vickie failed.
   exit 1
fi



-- 
Bill Gradwohl
bill at ycc.com
http://www.ycc.com
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