AIX : Examining ulimits of running process

Currently, AIX does not allow to examine the ulimits of a running process through the /proc file system. F.e. in Linux this is possible, as shown in the following example:

# cat /proc/4121/limits

Limit	Soft Limit	Hard Limit	Units
Max cpu time	unlimited	unlimited	ms
Max file size	unlimited	unlimited	bytes
Max data size	unlimited	unlimited	bytes
Max stack size	8388608	unlimited	bytes
Max core file size	ulimited	unlimited	bytes
Max resident set	unlimited	unlimited	bytes
. . .

The only alternative currently available in AIX is to use dbx and attach to the running process, as shown in the following example:

# dbx -a 700464
(dbx) proc rlimit

rlimit name	rlimit_cur	rlimit_max	(units)
RLIMIT_CPU:	(unlimited)	(unlimited)	sec
RLIMIT_FSIZE:	(unlimited)	(unlimited)	bytes
RLIMIT_DATA:	67108864	100663296	bytes
RLIMIT_STACK:	33554432	4294967296	bytes
RLIMIT_CORE:	(unlimited)	(unlimited)	bytes
RLIMIT_RSS:	(unlimited)	(unlimited)	bytes
. . .

(dbx) quit

The only major drawback from this alternative is that dbx interrupts the process by sending a SIGTRAP signal. After the dbx sessions finishes, the process terminates. A Design Change Request was made to address this.