32v 1m ps

PS(1) UNIX Programmer's Manual PS(1)

NAME

    ps - process status

SYNOPSIS

    ps [ aklx ] [ namelist ]

DESCRIPTION

    _P_s prints certain indicia about active processes.  The a
    option asks for information about all processes with termi-
    nals (ordinarily only one's own processes are displayed); x
    asks even about processes with no terminal; l asks for a
    long listing.  The short listing contains the process ID,
    tty letter, the cumulative execution time of the process and
    an approximation to the command line.

    The long listing is columnar and contains

    F    Flags associated with the process.  01: in memory; 02:
         system process; 04: locked in memory (e.g. for physical
         I/O); 10: being swapped; 20: being traced by another
         process; 200: partially swapped.

    S    The state of the process.  0: nonexistent; S: sleeping;
         W: waiting; R: running; I: intermediate; Z: terminated;
         T: stopped.

    UID  The user ID of the process owner.

    PID  The process ID of the process; as in certain cults it
         is possible to kill a process if you know its true
         name.

    PPID The process ID of the parent process.

    CPU  Processor utilization for scheduling.

    PRI  The priority of the process; high numbers mean low
         priority.

    NICE Used in priority computation.

    ADDR The memory address of the process if resident, other-
         wise the disk address.

    SZ   The size in blocks of the memory image of the process.

    WCHAN
         The event for which the process is waiting or sleeping;
         if blank, the process is running.

    TTY  The controlling tty for the process.

    TIME The cumulative execution time for the process.

    The command and its arguments.

    A process that has exited and has a parent, but has not yet
    been waited for by the parent is marked <defunct>.  _P_s makes
    an educated guess as to the file name and arguments given
    when the process was created by examining memory or the swap
    area.  The method is inherently somewhat unreliable and in
    any event a process is entitled to destroy this information,
    so the names cannot be counted on too much.

    If the k option is specified, the file /_u_s_r/_s_y_s/_c_o_r_e is used
    in place of /_d_e_v/_k_m_e_m.  This is used for postmortem system
    debugging.  If a second argument is given, it is taken to be
    the file containing the system's namelist.

FILES

    /unix         system namelist
    /dev/kmem     kernel memory
    /usr/sys/core alternate core file
    /dev          searched to find swap device and tty names

SEE ALSO

    kill(1)

BUGS

    Things can change while _p_s is running; the picture it gives
    is only a close approximation to reality.
    Some data printed for defunct processes is irrelevant.