count of mysqld process

[jongse park]

I want to know why there are many mysql process on host.
what is the reason?

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[root@mydb3 ~]$ ps -ef | grep mysql

root 1556 1 0 Apr19 ? 00:00:00 /bin/sh /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/

root 1586 1556 0 Apr19 ? 00:14:29 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 1599 1586 0 Apr19 ? 00:00:51 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 1600 1599 0 Apr19 ? 00:00:00 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 1601 1599 0 Apr19 ? 00:00:00 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 1602 1599 0 Apr19 ? 00:00:00 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 1604 1599 0 Apr19 ? 00:00:00 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 1620 1599 0 Apr19 ? 00:00:00 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 1621 1599 0 Apr19 ? 00:17:30 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 1622 1599 0 Apr19 ? 00:00:00 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 1623 1599 0 Apr19 ? 00:05:28 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 17339 1599 1 Jun23 ? 00:11:53 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 18445 1599 1 Jun23 ? 00:12:14 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 19703 1599 0 Jun23 ? 00:09:43 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 19903 1599 1 Jun23 ? 00:10:51 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 20256 1599 1 Jun23 ? 00:09:58 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 20257 1599 0 Jun23 ? 00:08:41 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 20601 1599 1 Jun23 ? 00:10:25 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

root 20962 1599 1 Jun23 ? 00:11:49 /user/wh/libexec/mysqld/libexec/

wh 20819 20802 0 09:33 pts/0 00:00:00 mysql -umysql -px xxxxxxx

root 22106 22049 0 10:08 pts/1 00:00:00 grep mysql



[root@mydb3 ~]$ uname -a

Linux mydb3 2.4.18-4SGI_XFS_1.1bigmem #1 SMP Tue May 28 09:22:29 CDT 2002 i686 unknown



mysql> select version();

+------------+

| version() |

+------------+

| 4.0.13-log |

+------------+

-----------------------

Please give me help.