ps(1)																	     ps(1)

NAME

       ps - report process status

SYNOPSIS

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

       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.

       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.

       -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.

       -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.  Mul-
		       tiple -o options can be specified; the format specification will be interpreted as the space-character-separated concatena-
		       tion 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 will be 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  sin-
		       gle 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) will be 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.

       Many  of  the options shown are used to select processes to list. If any are specified, the default list will be ignored and ps will select
       the processes 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 will be 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.

		       Z	Zombie state: process terminated and parent not waiting.

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

       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.

       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 TIME 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  will  be  used as the header text. The fields specified will be written in the order specified on the command line, and should be
       arranged in columns in the output. The field widths will be 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 will be at least as wide as the default header text. If
       all header text fields are null, no header line will be written.

       The following names are recognized in the POSIX locale:

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

       ruser	       The  real user ID of the process. This will be 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 will be the textual group ID, if it can be obtained and the	field  width  per-
		       mits, or a decimal representation otherwise.

       rgroup	       The  real group ID of the process. This will be 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 will be a decimal integer. The hh, mm and ss fields will be 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 will be 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 may truncate this value to the field width; it is imple-
		       mentation-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 may	have  been
		       modified by the application. Applications cannot depend on being able to modify their argument list and having that modifi-
		       cation be reflected in the output of ps.  The Solaris implementation limits the string to 80 bytes; the string is the  ver-
		       sion of the argument 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
		       may 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.

       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		 |
       |lwp		 LWP		|s		  S		 |
       |nlwp		 NLWP		|sid		  SID		 |
       |opri		 PRI		|stime		  STIME 	 |
       |osz		 SZ		|taskid 	  TASKID	 |
       |pmem		 %MEM		|uid		  UID		 |
       |pri		 PRI		|wchan		  WCHAN 	 |
       |ctid		 CTID		|zone		  ZONE		 |
       |				|zoneid 	  ZONEID	 |
       +--------------------------------+--------------------------------+

       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.

       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.

       The following exit values are returned:

       0		       Successful completion.

       >0		       An error occurred.

       /dev/pts/*

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

       /etc/passwd	       UID information supplier

       /proc/*		       process control files

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

       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |      ATTRIBUTE TYPE	     |	    ATTRIBUTE VALUE	   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |Availability		     |SUNWcsu			   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |CSI			     |Enabled (see )		   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |Interface Stability	     |Standard			   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+

       kill(1),  nice(1),  pagesize(1),  pgrep(1),  pmap(1), priocntl(1), who(1), getty(1M), proc(4), ttysrch(4), attributes(5), environ(5), stan-
       dards(5), zones(5)

       Things can change while ps is running. The snapshot it gives is true only for a split-second, and it may 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 will report all processes associated with the controlling terminal. If there is no con-
       trolling terminal, there will be no report other than the header.

       ps -ef or ps -o stime may 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).

								    9 Mar 2005								     ps(1)