Run program with a lockfile
rlock [options] lockfile program [args]
rlock [options] lockfile -- program options [args]
rlock creates NFS safe lockfiles. it can optionally run a program while holding the lock, ensuring lockfile removal on program exit. if a program is specified to be run rlock will spawn a background thread to kept the lockfile 'fresh' by touching it at a regular interval. in this way a lease is maintained on the lockfile and other processes attempting to obtain the lock can determine that it is in use. see the '--refresh' option for how to control the touch interval. any other process trying to obtain a lock will automatically remove a stale lockfile; a stale lockfile is one that is older than a certain age. this age be controled via the '--max_age' option.
LOCKFILE_DEBUG=1
causes internal actions of the library to be shown on STDERR.
rlock attempts to exit with the status of 'program' except where it cannot due to exceptional conditions. in addition the message
'RLOCK SUBCOMMAND FAILURE'
will be printed on STDERR if 'program' exits with non-zero status.
lockfile was written by Ara T. Howard <[email protected]>.
This manual page was converted by Decklin Foster <[email protected]> for the Debian project (but may be used by others).