UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

How can i correct this problem? when i want to use

Code:

ps -u | wc -l

this message crops up
Warning: bad ps syntax, perhaps a bogus '-'?

How can I correct this? i must count number of processes of the user for a script.. and i cant do it right because of this thing

Hi.

You should check the man page for ps.

So, for example:

Code:

ps -u userA,userB

On what platform do you get that problem? The reason I'm asking is that, for example, BSD ps behaves differently that Linux ps behaves differently than Solaris ps ...

A version that should work on most platforms:

Code:

ps -u $( id -u )

hmm thats alright i tried now with this and is not making any more problems, thxs a million!

---------- Post updated at 11:11 AM ---------- Previous update was at 11:00 AM ----------

hmm one thing though.. when I try to apply this principle to my script, is not working, it tells me something like 'command not found'

what i wrote now is this,

Code:

if [$(ps -u $ (id -u) | wc -l) -lt 5];
then echo "message1"
else echo "message2"
fi

what am i doing wrong? oh by the way, is Linux platform im using..

You appear to have a space between the $ and ( - remove it.

You're also missing spaces either side of [ and ]

Code:

if [ $(ps -u $(id -u) | wc -l) -lt 5 ]; then
  echo "message1"
else
  echo "message2"
fi

ok.. now this message isn't cropping anymore.. but something weird..
again, when i use it alone, the number of processes shows as 53..
but when I put it along with this..

Code:

if [ $(ps -u $(id -u) | wc -l) -lt 5 ]; then
  echo "message1";
else
  echo "message2";
fi

message2 comes up!!! why is it doing the contrary, when i asked it to show message1 in case the number of processes are more than 5? or this "-lt 5" is only if they're 5 processes currently running? help...

Is 53 less than 5?

-lt means less than. -gt means greater than.