How much time passes between the moment one of your child processes exits and when it is reaped? If they are not reaped in a timely manner, they will fill up the process table with defunct zombies. Have you tried this instead: 

$SIG{CHLD} = sub { wait() }

[download]

jeffa

L-LL-L--L-LL-L--L-LL-L--
-R--R-RR-R--R-RR-R--R-RR
B--B--B--B--B--B--B--B--
H---H---H---H---H---H---
(the triplet paradiddle with high-hat)

In reply to Re: fork() and wiatpid() quirk on RHEL AS 4 and PERL version 5.8.5 by jeffa
in thread fork() and wiatpid() quirk on RHEL AS 4 and PERL version 5.8.5 by nkx

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