defunct processes

[Brett Campbell]

Hello gracious list :)

While recently using and absolutely loving the openbox-3\.0(-rc[1-4])?
series of releases, i noticed a child-process-reaping error, or something
similar in my X11 experience with openbox.

we know that:

/usr/X11R6/bin/startx  invokes  /usr/bin/X11/xinit  which then invokes
/usr/bin/X11/X  as well as  /usr/local/bin/openbox ....

my ~/.xinitrc looks like:

---
#!/bin/sh

# set X defaults
xrdb ~/.Xdefaults &

# customize keyboard
xmodmap .Xmodmap &

# launch screensaver
xscreensaver -nosplash &

# launch monitors
gkrellm &

# start idesk (icon manager)
( sleep 3 ; idesk ) &

# renice X server
sudo renice -5 `pidof X` &

# launch wm
exec openbox
---

my process table then shows:

brett      658  S    08:32   0:00 -zsh
brett      756  S    08:33   0:00  \_ /bin/sh /usr/X11R6/bin/startx
brett      776  S    08:33   0:00      \_ xinit /home/brett/.xinitrc
root       777  S<   08:33   0:16          \_ /usr/bin/X11/X
brett      780  S    08:33   0:00          \_ openbox
brett      787  Z    08:33   0:00              \_ [xrdb] <defunct>
brett      788  Z    08:33   0:00              \_ [xmodmap] <defunct>
brett      789  S    08:33   0:00              \_ xscreensaver -nosplash
brett      790  S    08:33   0:04              \_ gkrellm
brett      791  S    08:33   0:00              \_ /bin/sh /home/brett/.xinitrc
brett      801  S    08:33   0:00              |   \_ idesk
brett      792  Z    08:33   0:00              \_ [.xinitrc] <defunct>
root       793  Z    08:33   0:00              \_ [renice] <defunct>

please excuse me if this paste is not legible in your mail reader.  

now, a lot of the processes that i launch from ~/.xinitrc become zombie
processes when i look at the process table.  i don't know why.

what's interesting here is the fact that pid 791 (/bin/sh ~/.xinitrc)
is a child of the openbox process.  idesk is the only child of 791,
and all the rest of my processes started via .xinitrc are children
of the openbox process (pid 780).

any ideas what i'm doing wrong here?

thanks for a great window manager, and an excellent mailing list.

Tim Riley is an unsung hero,
Brett Campbell
-- 
[ Brett R. Campbell ]
 -> Configuration Management / Systems Administration
 -> Collaborative Agent Design Research Center
 -> California Polytechnic State University, SLO, CA
 http://www.cadrc.calpoly.edu/frameset_content/content_about_us.html