Jesse L. Youngblood, a California state prisoner, appeals pro se from the district court’s judgment dismissing his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action alleging cruel and unusual punishment. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review for an abuse of discretion a district court’s dismissal for failure to serve, Puett v. Blandford, 912 F.2d 270, 275 (9th Cir.1990), and for failure to comply with a court order, Ash v. Cvetkov, 739 F.2d 493, 495 (9th Cir.1984). We vacate and remand. Dismissal of Youngblood’s action for failure to effect service was premature as Youngblood should have been given an opportunity to identify the defendants through limited discovery. See Gillespie v. Civiletti, 629 F.2d 637, 642 (9th Cir.1980) (<HOLDING>); see also Fed.R.Civ.P. 45 (permitting third
holding that unless discovery is granted as a matter of statute court rule or the constitution discovery is within the discretion of the trial court whose ruling will be upheld on appeal absent an abuse of discretion holding that while as a general matter discovery should be freely permitted  j jurisdictional discovery is justified only if the plaintiff reasonably demonstrates that it can supplement its jurisdictional allegations through discovery holding that a discovery exception to a statute of limitation applies only to the discovery of facts not discovery of the law holding that where a plaintiff is unaware of the identity of alleged defendants plaintiff should be given an opportunity through discovery to identify the unknown defendants unless it is clear that discovery would not uncover the identities or that the complaint would be dismissed on other grounds holding that plaintiff should identify when possible the role of individual defendants in the alleged fraud