Endless processing threads by manager/min/index.php

On occasion this happens on our server (Taken from a "top" linux log). It is some thread in the manager of Revo 2.2.4.


20095 username 25 0 128m 17m 12m R 100.0 0.2 2777:23 /usr/bin/php /home/username/public_html/manager/min/index.php
22025 username 25 0 128m 17m 12m R 99.5 0.2 2772:26 /usr/bin/php /home/username/public_html/manager/min/index.php

These 2 threads (currently still running as I want to debug them) are using 25% processing power of our entire dedicated server and have been running for a few days now it. I've seen this before and just killed them off in the past. But I am curious as to how a thread like this is not obeying the PHP max execution time limits on the server (assuming it overrides them repeatedly or something).

Does anyone know what this is and how to stop it happening in future?

Thanks!

I've actually seen this happen on multiple sites on multiple servers now.
I'm not sure how to debug what is happening here. I'm assuming it has somehting to do with the compress js/compress css options in the manager settings.

Any suggestions on how to ensure this cant happen?

Do you have zlib installed? You might also check the home for that code: https://github.com/mrclay/minify

If you figure something out please let us know.

Yes zlib is installed and when I use the manager I can see all the compressed combined js files loading ok. It seems to be a once in a blue moon thing. I cant reproduce it but have on several occasions noticed our server chewing away on processes for

manager/min/index.php

I had my max execution time set to 7 mins and have reduces to 30 secs. I am hoping that this will at least shorten the time it can get stuck, but it depends if it is even using any PHP processing power or wether it is all used by connected processes (queries and what not).
I dotn really know how to debug it further.

Any suggestions?

It depends on how PHP is being executed in your environment. Most CGI methods have timeout settings to prevent zombie processes like this from lasting indefinitely. But as far as the source of the issue, I'm at a loss as to why it would be running forever like that.

Thanks opengeek, In this case I am running a cpanel install (with control over WHM) with PHP 5 running as suPHP.

Still using suPHP because I've been told the security benefits are great when compared to cgi and I run a number of clietns off dedicated servers.

I dont really know how to debug further. It happened agian today as well (I found a process that had been whewing 100% CPU on one of our CPU cores for around 20 hours). Bit of a worry.

I've actually turned off the compress js option to see if that stops it happening (as I assume it is this option that is runnign the min/index.php).