I did some extra testing on this bug today. I compiled and installed the latest procps-ng (3.3.10) on Ubuntu 14.04 i386, and it sees the problem:
greearb@v-ubuntu-14-04-i386:~$ ./test-pkill System command failed: ERROR: system command "pkill -f my-funky-cmdline" terminated with signal 15 my-system rv: 15 greearb@v-ubuntu-14-04-i386:~$ pkill --version pkill from procps-ng 3.3.10 greearb@v-ubuntu-14-04-i386:~$ But, exact same procps and test-pkill code works fine on Fedora-20: [greearb@v-f20-32 ~]$ ./test-pkill System command failed: ERROR: system command "pkill -f my-funky-cmdline" had return code: 1 my-system rv: 256 [greearb@v-f20-32 ~]$ pkill --version pkill from procps-ng 3.3.10 [greearb@v-f20-32 ~]$ -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Touch seeded packages, which is subscribed to procps in Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1446909 Title: pkill kills self when called from C program Status in procps package in Ubuntu: New Bug description: This does not happen on Fedora. Source code example pasted below. ProblemType: Bug DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04 Package: procps 1:3.3.9-1ubuntu2.2 Uname: Linux 3.16.0-031600-generic x86_64 NonfreeKernelModules: zfs zunicode zcommon znvpair zavl ApportVersion: 2.14.1-0ubuntu3.10 Architecture: amd64 Date: Tue Apr 21 17:13:07 2015 InstallationDate: Installed on 2014-09-22 (211 days ago) InstallationMedia: Ubuntu-Server 14.04.1 LTS "Trusty Tahr" - Release amd64 (20140722.3) ProcEnviron: TERM=xterm PATH=(custom, no user) XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set> LANG=en_US.UTF-8 SHELL=/bin/bash SourcePackage: procps UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install) modified.conffile..etc.sysctl.conf: [modified] mtime.conffile..etc.sysctl.conf: 2014-09-30T12:34:06.956063 To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/procps/+bug/1446909/+subscriptions -- Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~touch-packages Post to : touch-packages@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~touch-packages More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp