ps(1)								   User Commands							     ps(1)

NAME

       ps - report process status

SYNOPSIS

       ps [-aAcdefjHlLPyZ] [-g grplist] [-h lgrplist]
	    [-n namelist] [-o format]... [-p proclist]
	    [-s sidlist] [-t term] [-u uidlist] [-U uidlist]
	    [-G gidlist] [-z zonelist]

DESCRIPTION

       The  ps command prints information about active processes. Without options, ps prints information about processes that have the same effec-
       tive user ID and the same controlling terminal as the invoker. The output contains only the process  ID,  terminal  identifier,	cumulative
       execution time, and the command name. Otherwise, the information that is displayed is controlled by the options.

       Some  options accept lists as arguments. Items in a list can be either separated by commas or else enclosed in quotes and separated by com-
       mas or spaces. Values for proclist and grplist must be numeric.

OPTIONS

       The following options are supported:

       -a	      Lists information about all processes most frequently requested: all those except session leaders and processes not  associ-
		      ated with a terminal.

       -A	      Lists information for all processes. Identical to -e, below.

       -c	      Prints  information  in  a  format that reflects scheduler properties as described in priocntl(1). The -c option affects the
		      output of the -f and -l options, as described below.

       -d	      Lists information about all processes except session leaders.

       -e	      Lists information about every process now running.

		      When the -eoption is specified, options -z, -t, -u, -U, -g, -G, -p, -g, -s and -a options have no effect.

       -f	      Generates a full listing. (See below for significance of columns in a full listing.)

       -g grplist     Lists only process data whose group leader's ID number(s) appears in grplist. (A group leader is a process whose process	ID
		      number is identical to its process group ID number.)

       -G gidlist     Lists  information  for processes whose real group ID numbers are given in gidlist. The gidlist must be a single argument in
		      the form of a blank- or comma-separated list.

		      -Lists only processes homed to the specified lgroups. Nothing is listed for any invalid lgroups given.

       -H	      Prints the home lgroup of the process under an additional column header, LGRP.

       -j	      Prints session ID and process group ID.

       -l	      Generates a long listing. (See below.)

       -L	      Prints information about each light weight process (lwp) in each selected process. (See below.)

       -n namelist    Specifies the name of an alternative system namelist file in place of the default. This option is accepted  for  compatibil-
		      ity, but is ignored.

       -o format      Prints information according to the format specification given in format. This is fully described in DISPLAY FORMATS. Multi-
		      ple -o options can be specified; the format specification is interpreted as the space-character-separated  concatenation	of
		      all the format option-arguments.

       -p proclist    Lists only process data whose process ID numbers are given in proclist.

       -P	      Prints the number of the processor to which the process or lwp is bound, if any, under an additional column header, PSR.

       -s sidlist     Lists information on all session leaders whose IDs appear in sidlist.

       -t term	      Lists  only  process data associated with term. Terminal identifiers are specified as a device file name, and an identifier.
		      For example, term/a, or pts/0.

       -u uidlist     Lists only process data whose effective user ID number or login name is given in uidlist. In the listing, the numerical user
		      ID is printed unless you give the -f option, which prints the login name.

       -U uidlist     Lists information for processes whose real user ID numbers or login names are given in uidlist. The uidlist must be a single
		      argument in the form of a blank- or comma-separated list.

       -y	      Under a long listing (-l), omits the obsolete F and ADDR columns and includes an RSS column to report the resident set  size
		      of the process. Under the -y option, both RSS and SZ (see below) is reported in units of kilobytes instead of pages.

       -z zonelist    Lists  only  processes  in the specified zones. Zones can be specified either by name or ID. This option is only useful when
		      executed in the global zone.

       -Z	      Prints the name of the zone with which the process is associated under an additional column header, ZONE.  The  ZONE  column
		      width  is  limited to 8 characters. Use ps -eZ for a quick way to see information about every process now running along with
		      the associated zone name. Use

			ps -eo zone,uid,pid,ppid,time,comm,...

		      to see zone names wider than 8 characters.

       Many of the options shown are used to select processes to list. If any are specified, the default list is ignored and ps selects  the  pro-
       cesses represented by the inclusive OR of all the selection-criteria options.

DISPLAY FORMATS

       Under  the  -f option, ps tries to determine the command name and arguments given when the process was created by examining the user block.
       Failing this, the command name is printed, as it would have appeared without the -f option, in square brackets.

       The column headings and the meaning of the columns in a ps listing are given below; the letters f and l indicate the option (full or  long,
       respectively) that causes the corresponding heading to appear; all means that the heading always appears. Note: These two options determine
       only what information is provided for a process; they do not determine which processes are listed.

       F(l)	     Flags (hexadecimal and additive) associated with the process. These flags are available for historical purposes;  no  meaning
		     should be currently ascribed to them.

       S (l)	     The state of the process:

		     O	  Process is running on a processor.

		     S	  Sleeping: process is waiting for an event to complete.

		     R	  Runnable: process is on run queue.

		     T	  Process is stopped, either by a job control signal or because it is being traced.

		     W	  Waiting: process is waiting for CPU usage to drop to the CPU-caps enforced limits.

		     Z	  Zombie state: process terminated and parent not waiting.

       UID (f,l)     The effective user ID number of the process (the login name is printed under the -f option).

       PID(all)      The process ID of the process (this datum is necessary in order to kill a process).

       PPID(f,l)     The process ID of the parent process.

       C(f,l)	     Processor utilization for scheduling (obsolete). Not printed when the -c option is used.

       CLS(f,l)      Scheduling class. Printed only when the -c option is used.

       PRI(l)	     The  priority  of	the process. Without the -c option, higher numbers mean lower priority. With the -c option, higher numbers
		     mean higher priority.

       NI(l)	     Nice value, used in priority computation. Not printed when the -c option is used. Only processes in  the  certain	scheduling
		     classes have a nice value.

       ADDR(l)	     The memory address of the process.

       SZ(l)	     The total size of the process in virtual memory, including all mapped files and devices, in pages. See pagesize(1).

       WCHAN(l)      The address of an event for which the process is sleeping (if blank, the process is running).

       STIME(f)      The  starting  time of the process, given in hours, minutes, and seconds. (A process begun more than twenty-four hours before
		     the ps inquiry is executed is given in months and days.)

       TTY(all)      The controlling terminal for the process (the message, ?, is printed when there is no controlling terminal).

       TIME(all)     The cumulative execution time for the process.

       LTIME(all)    The execution time for the lwp being reported.

       CMD(all)      The command name (the full command name and its arguments, up to a limit of 80 characters, are printed under the -f option).

       The following two additional columns are printed when the -j option is specified:

       PGID    The process ID of the process group leader.

       SID     The process ID of the session leader.

       The following two additional columns are printed when the -L option is specified:

       LWP     The lwp ID of the lwp being reported.

       NLWP    The number of lwps in the process (if -f is also specified).

       Under the -L option, one line is printed for each lwp in the process and the time-reporting fields STIME and LTIME show the values for  the
       lwp, not the process. A traditional single-threaded process contains only one lwp.

       A process that has exited and has a parent, but has not yet been waited for by the parent, is marked <defunct>.

   -o format
       The -o option allows the output format to be specified under user control.

       The  format  specification  must  be a list of names presented as a single argument, blank- or comma-separated. Each variable has a default
       header. The default header can be overridden by appending an equals sign and the new text of the header. The rest of the characters in  the
       argument is used as the header text. The fields specified are written in the order specified on the command line, and should be arranged in
       columns in the output. The field widths are selected by the system to be at least as wide as the header text (default or overridden value).
       If the header text is null, such as -o user=, the field width is at least as wide as the default header text. If all header text fields are
       null, no header line is written.

       The following names are recognized in the POSIX locale:

       user	 The effective user ID of the process. This is the textual user ID, if it can be obtained and the field width permits, or a  deci-
		 mal representation otherwise.

       ruser	 The  real  user  ID  of the process. This is the textual user ID, if it can be obtained and the field width permits, or a decimal
		 representation otherwise.

       group	 The effective group ID of the process. This is the textual group ID, if it can be obtained and the field width permits, or a dec-
		 imal representation otherwise.

       rgroup	 The  real  group ID of the process. This is the textual group ID, if it can be obtained and the field width permits, or a decimal
		 representation otherwise.

       pid	 The decimal value of the process ID.

       ppid	 The decimal value of the parent process ID.

       pgid	 The decimal value of the process group ID.

       pcpu	 The ratio of CPU time used recently to CPU time available in  the  same  period,  expressed  as  a  percentage.  The  meaning	of
		 ``recently'' in this context is unspecified. The CPU time available is determined in an unspecified manner.

       vsz	 The total size of the process in virtual memory, in kilobytes.

       nice	 The decimal value of the system scheduling priority of the process. See nice(1).

       etime	 In the POSIX locale, the elapsed time since the process was started, in the form:

		 [[dd-]hh:]mm:ss

		 where

		 dd    is the number of days

		 hh    is the number of hours

		 mm    is the number of minutes

		 ss    is the number of seconds

		 The dd field is a decimal integer. The hh, mm and ss fields is two-digit decimal integers padded on the left with zeros.

       time	 In the POSIX locale, the cumulative CPU time of the process in the form:

		 [dd-]hh:mm:ss

		 The dd, hh, mm, and ss fields is as described in the etime specifier.

       tty	 The name of the controlling terminal of the process (if any) in the same format used by the who(1) command.

       comm	 The name of the command being executed (argv[0] value) as a string.

       args	 The  command with all its arguments as a string. The implementation might truncate this value to the field width; it is implemen-
		 tation-dependent whether any further truncation occurs. It is unspecified whether the string represented  is  a  version  of  the
		 argument  list as it was passed to the command when it started, or is a version of the arguments as they might have been modified
		 by the application. Applications cannot depend on being able to modify their  argument  list  and  having  that  modification	be
		 reflected  in	the output of ps. The Solaris implementation limits the string to 80 bytes; the string is the version of the argu-
		 ment list as it was passed to the command when it started.

       The following names are recognized in the Solaris implementation:

       f	  Flags (hexadecimal and additive) associated with the process.

       s	  The state of the process.

       c	  Processor utilization for scheduling (obsolete).

       uid	  The effective user ID number of the process as a decimal integer.

       ruid	  The real user ID number of the process as a decimal integer.

       gid	  The effective group ID number of the process as a decimal integer.

       rgid	  The real group ID number of the process as a decimal integer.

       projid	  The project ID number of the process as a decimal integer.

       project	  The project ID of the process as a textual value if that value can be obtained; otherwise, as a decimal integer.

       zoneid	  The zone ID number of the process as a decimal integer.

       zone	  The zone ID of the process as a textual value if that value can be obtained; otherwise, as a decimal integer.

       sid	  The process ID of the session leader.

       taskid	  The task ID of the process.

       class	  The scheduling class of the process.

       pri	  The priority of the process. Higher numbers mean higher priority.

       opri	  The obsolete priority of the process. Lower numbers mean higher priority.

       lwp	  The decimal value of the lwp ID. Requesting this formatting option causes one line to be printed for each lwp in the process.

       nlwp	  The number of lwps in the process.

       psr	  The number of the processor to which the process or lwp is bound.

       pset	  The ID of the processor set to which the process or lwp is bound.

       addr	  The memory address of the process.

       osz	  The total size of the process in virtual memory, in pages.

       wchan	  The address of an event for which the process is sleeping (if -, the process is running).

       stime	  The starting time or date of the process, printed with no blanks.

       rss	  The resident set size of the process, in kilobytes. The rss value reported by ps is an estimate provided by proc(4)  that  might
		  underestimate  the  actual resident set size. Users who wish to get more accurate usage information for capacity planning should
		  use pmap(1) -x instead.

       pmem	  The ratio of the process's resident set size to the physical memory on the machine, expressed as a percentage.

       fname	  The first 8 bytes of the base name of the process's executable file.

       ctid	  The contract ID of the process contract the process is a member of as a decimal integer.

       lgrp	  The home lgroup of the process.

       Only comm and args are allowed to contain blank characters; all others, including the Solaris implementation variables, are not.

       The following table specifies the default header to be used in the POSIX locale corresponding to each format specifier.

       +-----------------------------------------------------------------+
       |    Format	    Default	     Format	     Default	 |
       |  Specifier	     Header	    Specifier	      Header	 |
       +-----------------------------------------------------------------+
       |     args	    COMMAND	      ppid	       PPID	 |
       |     comm	    COMMAND	     rgroup	      RGROUP	 |
       |    etime	    ELAPSED	      ruser	      RUSER	 |
       |    group	     GROUP	      time	       TIME	 |
       |     nice	       NI	       tty		TT	 |
       |     pcpu	      %CPU	      user	       USER	 |
       |     pgid	      PGID	       vsz	       VSZ	 |
       |     pid	      PID					 |
       +-----------------------------------------------------------------+

       The following table lists the Solaris implementation format specifiers and the default header used with each.

       +-----------------------------------------------------------------+
       |    Format	    Default	     Format	     Default	 |
       |  Specifier	     Header	    Specifier	      Header	 |
       +-----------------------------------------------------------------+
       |     addr	      ADDR	     projid	      PROJID	 |
       |      c 	       C	     project	     PROJECT	 |
       |    class	      CLS	       psr	       PSR	 |
       |      f 	       F	      rgid	       RGID	 |
       |    fname	    COMMAND	       rss	       RSS	 |
       |     gid	      GID	      ruid	       RUID	 |
       |     lgrp	      LGRP		s		S	 |
       |     lwp	      LWP	       sid	       SID	 |
       |     nlwp	      NLWP	      stime	      STIME	 |
       |     opri	      PRI	     taskid	      TASKID	 |
       |     osz	       SZ	       uid	       UID	 |
       |     pmem	      %MEM	      wchan	      WCHAN	 |
       |     pri	      PRI	      zone	       ZONE	 |
       |     ctid	      CTID	     zoneid	      ZONEID	 |
       +-----------------------------------------------------------------+

EXAMPLES

       Example 1 Using ps Command

       The command:

	 example% ps -o user,pid,ppid=MOM -o args

       writes the following in the POSIX locale:

	  USER	PID   MOM   COMMAND
	 helene  34    12   ps -o uid,pid,ppid=MOM -o args

       The contents of the COMMAND field need not be the same due to possible truncation.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

       See environ(5) for descriptions of the following environment variables that affect the execution of ps:	LANG,  LC_ALL,	LC_CTYPE,  LC_MES-
       SAGES, LC_TIME, and NLSPATH.

       COLUMNS	  Override the system-selected horizontal screen size, used to determine the number of text columns to display.

EXIT STATUS

       The following exit values are returned:

       0     Successful completion.

       >0    An error occurred.

FILES

       /dev/pts/*

       /dev/term/*    terminal (``tty'') names searcher files

       /etc/passwd    UID information supplier

       /proc/*	      process control files

ATTRIBUTES

       See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:

       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |      ATTRIBUTE TYPE	     |	    ATTRIBUTE VALUE	   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |Availability		     |SUNWcsu			   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |CSI			     |Enabled (see USAGE)	   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |Interface Stability	     |Committed 		   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |Standard		     |See standards(5). 	   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+

SEE ALSO

       kill(1),  lgrpinfo(1),  nice(1),  pagesize(1),  pmap(1),  priocntl(1),  who(1),	getty(1M), proc(4), ttysrch(4), attributes(5), environ(5),
       resource_controls(5), standards(5), zones(5)

NOTES

       Things can change while ps is running. The snapshot it gives is true only for a split-second, and it might not be accurate by the time  you
       see it. Some data printed for defunct processes is irrelevant.

       If no options to select processes are specified, ps reports all processes associated with the controlling terminal. If there is no control-
       ling terminal, there is no report other than the header.

       ps -ef or ps -o stime might not report the actual start of a tty login session, but rather an earlier time, when a getty was last respawned
       on the tty line.

       ps is CSI-enabled except for login names (usernames).

SunOS 5.11							    9 Jan 2008								     ps(1)