In modern computer operating systems, a process (or task) may wait on another process to complete its execution. In most systems, a parent process can create an independently executing child process. The parent process may then issue a wait system call, which suspends the execution of the parent process while the child executes. When the child process terminates, it returns an exit status to the operating system, which is then returned to the waiting parent process. The parent process then resumes execution.

Modern operating systems also provide system calls that allow process threads to create other threads and wait for them to terminate ("join" them) in a similar fashion.

An operating system may provide variations of the wait call that allow a process to wait for any of its children processes to exit, or to wait for a single specific child process (identified by its process-ID) to exit.

Some operating systems issue a signal (SIGCHLD) to the parent process when a child process terminates, notifying the parent process and allowing it to then retrieve the child process's exit status.

The exit status returned by a child process typically indicates whether the process terminated normally or abnormally. For normal termination, this status also includes the exit code (usually a small integer value) that the process returned to the system.

A child process that terminates but is never waited on by its parent becomes a zombie process. Such a process continues to exist as an entry in the system process table even though it is no longer an actively executing program. Such situations are typically handled with a special "reaper" process that locates zombies and retrieves their exit status, allowing the operating system to then deallocate their resources.

Similarly, a child process whose parent process terminates before it does becomes an orphan process. Such situations are typically handled with a special "root" (or "init") process, which is assigned as the new parent of a process when its parent process exits. This special process detects when an orphan process terminates and then retrieves its exit status, allowing the system to deallocate the terminated child process.

See also

• Exit
• Fork
• Sleep
• Spawn
• Wait command
• Wait state