Process Will Not Terminate Unless System Is In User-mode

Last reviewed: November 2, 1995
Article ID: Q92761

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Win32 Application Programming Interface (API) included with:
```
    - Microsoft Windows NT versions 3.1 and 3.5
```

Under Windows NT, a process will not be terminated unless the system is in user-mode. Suppose that TerminateProcess() is called while a device driver or filesystem code is being executed. The system will wait until the threads are running user code before marking the process for termination. On system exit, processes that were the target of a TerminateProcess() will be killed.

This may affect drivers. If a driver is waiting for an object or multiple objects in WaitMode or UserMode, its wait may complete unsuccessfully due to a termination request. Any code that does a UserMode wait or an Alertable wait must check the return status of the wait call. If the wait fails with STATUS_USER_APC or STATUS_ALERTED, this is not an error. The driver should cleanup and return to user-mode.

Additional reference words: 3.10 3.50
KBCategory: kbprg
KBSubcategory: BseProcThrd

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Last reviewed: November 2, 1995
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