Defunct Process Monitoring extension
- Latest Dynatrace
- Extension
- Published Oct 27, 2025
Monitor defunct processes stuck on your Linux servers.
A defunct process is a process that has completed but still shows in the process table. This is typically due to its parent process being corrupted or experiencing an issue.
The Defunct Process Monitoring OneAgent extension runs on your Linux hosts to report the number of defunct processes on your servers.
Get started
This extension runs on the OneAgent on your Linux hosts. To get started, install this extension and add a monitoring configuration.
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You can configure the extension to run on a single host, a specified host group or management zone, or across your environment.
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Choose the frequency you would like the extension to check for defunct processes, and set the ingestion type:
- Metric: A single metric
linux.defunct_processesis ingested per host, providing the number of defunct processes found. - Log: If a defunct process is found, a log is ingested per host, containing a log line for each defunct process.
- Both: Both of the above.
- Metric: A single metric
Details
This extension works by making use of the ps -ef | grep defunct command on your hosts. This detects any processes running with the <defunct> mark attached to them.
The daily license consumption for this extension can be calculated as follows:
Custom Metrics per day = ((1440/frequency) * (# of configured hosts))Log lines per day = (((1440/frequency) * (# of defunct processes)) * (# of configured hosts))
Feature sets
When activating your extension using monitoring configuration, you can limit monitoring to one of the feature sets. To work properly the extension has to collect at least one metric after the activation.
In highly segmented networks, feature sets can reflect the segments of your environment. Then, when you create a monitoring configuration, you can select a feature set and a corresponding ActiveGate group that can connect to this particular segment.
All metrics that aren't categorized into any feature set are considered to be the default and are always reported.
A metric inherits the feature set of a subgroup, which in turn inherits the feature set of a group. Also, the feature set defined on the metric level overrides the feature set defined on the subgroup level, which in turn overrides the feature set defined on the group level.
| Metric name | Metric key | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Defunct Process Count | linux.defunct_processes | Number of defunt processes on this host |
