*rant*
Most of the time when I see someone asking how to kill a process on *nix I see someone responding "kill -9 <pid>".
Alas, this is NOT the way you kill a process … the process gets killed alright, and a little too hard. So for everyone not understanding, here’s a small explanation. Everyone who knows, just skip to the next post 
Normally when you (or something) kill a process, it gets a SIGTERM. When a program receives SIGTERM, it knows it should shut down and saves all its open files (or prompts the user), closes its file handles, etc etc. When you use -9, you send a SIGKILL which causes the OS to clean up the process without further ado (e.g. when it doesn’t respond to SIGTERM anymore), and shut it down. This also kills the process indeed, but doesn’t always have the intended effect when looking at data loss… Remember it 
*end of rant*
Incoming Links (via Technorati):
- An Interview With Dr. Wallace J Nichols, Blue Marbles Project Founder
Technorati's exclusive interview with Ocean Biologist Dr. Wallace J. Nichols, founder of the Blue Marbles Project. - About Antioxidants
Antioxidants, ORACs and free-radicals, oh my! - Ministers Caught Watching Porn in the Legislative Assembly
Two Karnataka BJP ministers caught watching porn film in Legislative assembly - From Titanic to Concordia
A Century After the Titanic Disaster, A Rush to Compare the Costa Concordia's Fate - South's Tallest Skyscraper Sold At Auction Today
BofA Plaza Not in Distress, but Disgusted