Short solution... ___________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________ $(lsof | grep $(ls -1 .nfs*) | awk '{print "kill -9 " $2}') ___________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________ ".nfs000000..." files appear, when an open file on the NFS share gets removed. Such files get deleted automatically when they're closed. On the NFS share there's a script named "testscript.ksh" and an old vim backup copy of it: ========================================================================================== goofy:ORCL:/app/orcl/nfs/bin$ ll total 168 drwxr-xr-x 6 oracle orainst 4096 Jun 10 10:16 . drwxrwxrwx 4 oracle orainst 4096 Jun 10 10:17 .. -rw-r--r-- 1 oracle orainst 16384 Jun 9 17:39 .testscript.ksh.swp -rwxr-xr-x 1 oracle orainst 14510 Jun 10 10:16 testscript.ksh Deleting the vim backup copy... =============================== goofy:ORCL:/app/orcl/nfs/bin$ rm .testscript.ksh.swp ...results in an ".nfs000000..." file ===================================== goofy:ORCL:/app/orcl/nfs/bin$ ll total 168 drwxr-xr-x 6 oracle orainst 4096 Jun 10 10:17 . drwxrwxrwx 4 oracle orainst 4096 Jun 10 10:17 .. -rw-r--r-- 1 oracle orainst 16384 Jun 9 17:39 .nfs00000000041a3cb50000000b -rwxr-xr-x 1 oracle orainst 14510 Jun 10 10:16 testscript.ksh Trying to delete the ".nfs000000..." file fails: ================================================ goofy:ORCL:/app/orcl/nfs/bin$ rm .nfs00000000041a3cb50000000b rm: cannot remove `.nfs00000000041a3cb50000000b': Device or resource busy Use "lsof" command ("list open files") to identify the process who holds the open file: ======================================================================================= goofy:ORCL:/app/orcl/nfs/bin$ lsof | grep nfs00000000041a3cb50000000b vi 6618 oracle 4u REG 0,19 16384 68828341 /app/orcl/nfs/bin/.nfs00000000041a3cb50000000b (10.182.138.201:/vol/data/stoerm_a_nor_2) Verify the identified process using "ps -ef"... =============================================== goofy:ORCL:/app/orcl/nfs/bin$ ps -ef | grep 6618 oracle 6618 670 0 Jun09 pts/0 00:00:00 vi testscript.ksh oracle 20691 16405 0 10:21 pts/6 00:00:00 grep 6618 ...and kill it! =============== goofy:ORCL:/app/orcl/nfs/bin$ kill -9 6618 Now the ".nfs000000..." file has disappeared: ============================================= goofy:ORCL:/app/orcl/nfs/bin$ ll total 152 drwxr-xr-x 6 oracle orainst 4096 Jun 10 10:21 . drwxrwxrwx 4 oracle orainst 4096 Jun 10 10:17 .. -rwxr-xr-x 1 oracle orainst 14510 Jun 10 10:16 testscript.ksh