When I run the code below
#include <stdio.h>
#include <sys/types.h>
//int i=0;
int main(){
int id ;
id = fork() ;
printf("id value : %d\n",id);
if ( id == 0 )
{
printf ( "Child : Hello I am the child process\n");
printf ( "Child : Child’s PID: %d\n", getpid());
printf ( "Child : Parent’s PID: %d\n", getppid());
}
else
{
printf ( "Parent : Hello I am the parent process\n" ) ;
printf ( "Parent : Parent’s PID: %d\n", getpid());
printf ( "Parent : Child’s PID: %d\n", id);
}
}
My output is
id value : 20173
Parent : Hello I am the parent process
Parent : Parent’s PID: 20172
Parent : Child’s PID: 20173
id value : 0
Child : Hello I am the child process
Child : Child’s PID: 20173
Child : Parent’s PID: 1
How can the parent's PID(20172) differ from the child's parent's ID (1)? Shouldn't those two be equal?
The getpid() function returns the process ID of the calling process. The getpgrp() function returns the process group ID of the calling process. The getppid() function returns the parent process ID of the calling process.
getpid() returns the process ID (PID) of the calling process. (This is often used by routines that generate unique temporary filenames.) getppid() returns the process ID of the parent of the calling process.
getppid() : returns the process ID of the parent of the calling process. If the calling process was created by the fork() function and the parent process still exists at the time of the getppid function call, this function returns the process ID of the parent process.
The value returned by getppid() is the process ID of the parent process for the calling process. A process ID value of 1 indicates that there is no parent process associated with the calling process.
What's happening is that the parent is terminating before the child runs. this leaves the child as an orphan and it gets adopted by the root process with PID of 1. If you put a delay or read data from stdin rather than letting the parent terminate you'll see the result you expect.
Process ID 1 is usually the init process primarily responsible for starting and shutting down the system. The init (short for initialization) is a daemon process that is the direct or indirect ancestor of all other processes. wiki link for init
As user314104 points out the wait() and waitpid() functions are designed to allow a parent process to suspend itself until the state of a child process changes. So a call to wait() in the parent branch of your if statement would cause the parent to wait for the child to terminate.
If you love us? You can donate to us via Paypal or buy me a coffee so we can maintain and grow! Thank you!
Donate Us With