1.\" Copyright (c) 1980, 1990, 1991, 1993, 1994 2.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 3.\" 4.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 5.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 6.\" are met: 7.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 8.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 9.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 11.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 12.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 13.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 14.\" without specific prior written permission. 15.\" 16.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 17.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 18.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 19.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 20.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 21.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 22.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 23.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 24.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 25.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 26.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 27.\" 28.\" @(#)ps.1 8.3 (Berkeley) 4/18/94 29.\" $FreeBSD: src/bin/ps/ps.1,v 1.24.2.7 2002/06/20 22:43:33 charnier Exp $ 30.\" 31.Dd January 1, 2021 32.Dt PS 1 33.Os 34.Sh NAME 35.Nm ps 36.Nd process status 37.Sh SYNOPSIS 38.Nm 39.Op Fl AaCcefHhjlmrRSTuvwx 40.Op Fl M Ar core 41.Op Fl N Ar system 42.Op Fl O Ar fmt 43.Op Fl o Ar fmt 44.Op Fl p Ar pid 45.Op Fl t Ar tty 46.Op Fl U Ar username 47.Nm 48.Op Fl L 49.Sh DESCRIPTION 50The 51.Nm 52utility 53displays a header line followed by lines containing information about your 54processes that have controlling terminals. 55This information is sorted by controlling terminal, then by process ID. 56.Pp 57The information displayed is selected based on a set of keywords (see the 58.Fl L 59.Fl O 60and 61.Fl o 62options). 63The default output format includes, for each process, the process' ID, 64controlling terminal, CPU time (including both user and system time), 65state, and associated command. 66.Pp 67The process file system (see 68.Xr procfs 5 ) 69should be mounted when 70.Nm 71is executed, otherwise not all information will be available. 72.Pp 73The options are as follows: 74.Bl -tag -width indent 75.It Fl a 76Display information about other users' processes as well as your own. 77This can be disabled by setting the 78.Va security.ps_showallprocs 79sysctl to zero. 80.It Fl A 81Same as 82.Fl ax . 83.It Fl c 84Change the ``command'' column output to just contain the executable name, 85rather than the full command line. 86.It Fl C 87Change the way the CPU percentage is calculated by using a ``raw'' 88CPU calculation that ignores ``resident'' time (this normally has 89no effect). 90.It Fl e 91Display the environment as well. 92.It Fl f 93Show commandline and environment information about swapped out processes. 94This option is honored only if the uid of the user is 0. 95.It Fl H 96Print one line per lightweight process (LWP) instead of one line per process. 97When this option is set and the 98.Fl o 99option is not set, the 100.Cm tid 101column is inserted in the output format after the 102.Cm pid 103one. 104.It Fl h 105Repeat the information header as often as necessary to guarantee one 106header per page of information. 107.It Fl j 108Print information associated with the following keywords: 109.Cm user , pid , ppid , pgid , sess , jobc , state , tt , time , 110and 111.Cm command . 112.It Fl L 113List the set of available keywords. 114.It Fl l 115Display information associated with the following keywords: 116.Cm uid , pid , ppid , cpu , pri , nice , vsz , rss , wchan , state , 117.Cm tt , time , 118and 119.Cm command . 120.It Fl M 121Extract values associated with the name list from the specified core 122instead of the default 123.Pa /dev/kmem . 124.It Fl m 125Sort by memory usage, instead of by process ID. 126.It Fl N 127Extract the name list from the specified system instead of the default 128.Pa /boot/kernel . 129.It Fl O 130Add the information associated with the space or comma separated list 131of keywords specified, after the process ID, 132in the default information 133display. 134Keywords may be appended with an equals (``='') sign and a string. 135This causes the printed header to use the specified string instead of 136the standard header. 137.It Fl o 138Display information associated with the space or comma separated list 139of keywords specified. 140Keywords may be appended with an equals (``='') sign and a string. 141This causes the printed header to use the specified string instead of 142the standard header. 143.It Fl p 144Display information associated with the specified process ID. 145.It Fl r 146Sort by current CPU usage, instead of by process ID. 147.It Fl R 148Subsort by parent/child chain. This very useful option makes 149the parent/child associations clear and understandable. 150If used in combination with 151.Fl p 152then all children of the specified process will be output 153recursively in addition to the process itself. 154.It Fl S 155Change the way the process time is calculated by summing all exited 156children to their parent process. 157.It Fl T 158Display information about processes attached to the device associated 159with the standard input. 160.It Fl t 161Display information about processes attached to the specified terminal 162device. 163.It Fl U 164Display the processes belonging to the specified 165.Ar username . 166.It Fl u 167Display information associated with the following keywords: 168.Cm user , pid, %cpu , %mem , vsz , rss , tt , state , start , time , 169and 170.Cm command . 171The 172.Fl u 173option implies the 174.Fl r 175option. 176.It Fl v 177Display information associated with the following keywords: 178.Cm pid , state , time , sl , re , pagein , vsz , rss , lim , tsiz , 179.Cm %cpu , %mem 180and 181.Cm command . 182The 183.Fl v 184option implies the 185.Fl m 186option. 187.It Fl w 188Use 132 columns to display information, instead of the default which 189is your window size. 190If the 191.Fl w 192option is specified more than once, 193.Nm 194will use as many columns as necessary without regard for your window size. 195.It Fl x 196Display information about processes without controlling terminals. 197.El 198.Pp 199A complete list of the available keywords are listed below. 200Some of these keywords are further specified as follows: 201.Bl -tag -width ".Cm lstart" 202.It Cm %cpu 203The CPU utilization of the process; this is a decaying average over up to 204a minute of previous (real) time. 205Since the time base over which this is computed varies (since processes may 206be very young) it is possible for the sum of all 207.Cm %cpu 208fields to exceed 100%. 209.It Cm %mem 210The percentage of real memory used by this process. 211.It Cm flags 212The flags associated with the process as in 213the include file 214.In sys/proc.h . 215.It Cm lim 216The soft limit on memory used, specified via a call to 217.Xr setrlimit 2 . 218.It Cm lstart 219The exact time the command started, using the ``%c'' format described in 220.Xr strftime 3 . 221.It Cm nice 222The process scheduling increment (see 223.Xr setpriority 2 ) . 224.It Cm rss 225the real memory (resident set) size of the process (in 1024 byte units). 226.It Cm start 227The time the command started. 228If the command started less than 24 hours ago, the start time is 229displayed using the ``%l:ps.1p'' format described in 230.Xr strftime 3 . 231If the command started less than 7 days ago, the start time is 232displayed using the ``%a6.15p'' format. 233Otherwise, the start time is displayed using the ``%e%b%y'' format. 234.It Cm state 235The state is given by a sequence of letters, for example, 236.Dq Li RWNA . 237The first letter indicates the run state of the process: 238.Pp 239.Bl -tag -width indent -compact 240.It Li B 241Marks a blocked kernel thread. 242.It Li D 243Marks a process in disk (or other short term, uninterruptible) wait. 244.It Li I 245Marks a process that is idle (sleeping for longer than about 20 seconds). 246.It Li J 247Marks a process which is in 248.Xr jail 2 . 249The hostname of the prison can be found in 250.Pa /proc/ Ns Ao Ar pid Ac Ns Pa /status . 251.It Li R 252Marks a runnable process and is followed by the CPU number. 253.It Li S 254Marks a process that is sleeping for less than about 20 seconds. 255.It Li T 256Marks a stopped process. 257.It Li y 258Marks a process with the RESTRICTEDROOT capability set (both SELF and EXEC). 259.It Li Y 260Marks a process with the RESTRICTEDROOT and the SENSITIVEROOT capabilities 261set (both SELF and EXEC). Other capabilities are ignored. 262.It Li Z 263Marks a dead process (a 264.Dq zombie ) . 265.El 266.Pp 267Additional characters after these, if any, indicate additional state 268information: 269.Pp 270.Bl -tag -width indent -compact 271.It Li + 272The process is in the foreground process group of its control terminal. 273.It Li < 274The process has raised CPU scheduling priority. 275.It Li > 276The process has specified a soft limit on memory requirements and is 277currently exceeding that limit; such a process is (necessarily) not 278swapped. 279.It Li A 280the process has asked for random page replacement 281.Pf ( Dv MADV_RANDOM , 282from 283.Xr madvise 2 , 284for example, 285.Xr lisp 1 286in a garbage collect). 287.It Li E 288The process is trying to exit. 289.It Li N 290The process has reduced CPU scheduling priority (see 291.Xr setpriority 2 ) . 292.It Li S 293The process has asked for FIFO page replacement 294.Pf ( Dv MADV_SEQUENTIAL , 295from 296.Xr madvise 2 , 297for example, a large image processing program using virtual memory to 298sequentially address voluminous data). 299.It Li s 300The process is a session leader. 301.It Li V 302The process is suspended during a 303.Xr vfork 2 . 304.It Li W 305The process is swapped out. 306.It Li X 307The process is being traced or debugged. 308.El 309.It Cm tt 310An abbreviation for the pathname of the controlling terminal, if any. 311The abbreviation consists of the three letters following 312.Pa /dev/tty , 313or, for the console, ``con''. 314This is followed by a ``-'' if the process can no longer reach that 315controlling terminal (i.e., it has been revoked). 316.It Cm wchan 317The event (an address in the system) on which a process waits. 318When printed numerically, the initial part of the address is 319trimmed off and the result is printed in hex, for example, 0x80324000 prints 320as 324000. Note that blocked threads often only have ascii wchan's. 321.El 322.Pp 323When printing using the 324.Cm command 325keyword, a process that has exited and 326has a parent that has not yet waited for the process (in other words, a zombie) 327is listed as ``<defunct>'', and a process which is blocked while trying 328to exit is listed as ``<exiting>''. 329The 330.Nm 331utility 332makes an educated guess as to the file name and arguments given when the 333process was created by examining memory or the swap area. 334The method is inherently somewhat unreliable and in any event a process 335is entitled to destroy this information, so the names cannot be depended 336on too much. 337The 338.Cm ucomm 339(accounting) keyword can, however, be depended on. 340.Sh KEYWORDS 341The following is a complete list of the available keywords and their 342meanings. 343Several of them have aliases (keywords which are synonyms). 344.Pp 345.Bl -tag -width ".Cm sigignore" -compact 346.It Cm %cpu 347percentage CPU usage (alias 348.Cm pcpu ) 349.It Cm %mem 350percentage memory usage (alias 351.Cm pmem ) 352.It Cm acflag 353accounting flag (alias 354.Cm acflg ) 355.It Cm batch 356batchness of the process (higher numbers mean less interactivity) 357.It Cm command 358command and arguments (alias 359.Cm args ) 360.It Cm cpu 361short-term CPU usage factor (for scheduling) 362.It Cm f 363the process flags, in hexadecimal (alias 364.Cm flags ) 365.It Cm inblk 366total blocks read (alias 367.Cm inblock ) 368.It Cm jail 369jail ID 370.It Cm jobc 371job control count 372.It Cm ktrace 373tracing flags 374.\" .It Cm ktracep 375.\" tracing vnode 376.It Cm lastcpu 377CPU ID the process was last scheduled on 378.It Cm lim 379memoryuse limit 380.It Cm login 381login name of user who started the process (alias 382.Cm logname ) 383.It Cm lstart 384time started 385.It Cm majflt 386total page faults 387.It Cm minflt 388total page reclaims 389.It Cm msgrcv 390total messages received (reads from pipes/sockets) 391.It Cm msgsnd 392total messages sent (writes on pipes/sockets) 393.It Cm nice 394nice value (alias 395.Cm ni ) 396.It Cm nivcsw 397total involuntary context switches 398.It Cm nlwp 399number of lightweight processes 400.It Cm nsigs 401total signals taken (alias 402.Cm nsignals ) 403.It Cm nswap 404total swaps in/out 405.It Cm nvcsw 406total voluntary context switches 407.It Cm nwchan 408wait channel (as an address) 409.It Cm oublk 410total blocks written (alias 411.Cm oublock ) 412.It Cm p_ru 413resource usage (valid only for zombie) 414.It Cm paddr 415swap address 416.It Cm pagein 417pageins (same as 418.Cm majflt ) 419.It Cm pgid 420process group number 421.It Cm pid 422process ID 423.It Cm ppid 424parent process ID 425.It Cm pri 426scheduling priority (lower == better) 427.It Cm re 428core residency time (in seconds; 127 = infinity) 429.It Cm rgid 430real group ID 431.\" .It Cm rlink 432.\" reverse link on run queue, or 0 433.It Cm rss 434resident set size 435.It Cm rsz 436resident set size + (text size / text use count) (alias 437.Cm rssize ) 438.It Cm rtprio 439realtime priority (101 = not a realtime process) 440.It Cm ruid 441real user ID 442.It Cm ruser 443user name (from ruid) 444.It Cm sess 445session pointer 446.It Cm sig 447pending signals (alias 448.Cm pending ) 449.It Cm sigcatch 450caught signals (alias 451.Cm caught ) 452.It Cm sigignore 453ignored signals (alias 454.Cm ignored ) 455.It Cm sigmask 456blocked signals (alias 457.Cm blocked ) 458.It Cm sl 459sleep time (in seconds; 127 = infinity) 460.It Cm start 461time started 462.It Cm state 463symbolic process state (alias 464.Cm stat ) 465.It Cm svgid 466saved gid from a setgid executable 467.It Cm svuid 468saved uid from a setuid executable 469.It Cm tdev 470control terminal device number 471.It Cm tdpri 472LWKT thread priority (0-31, 31 highest), and critical section count 473.It Cm tid 474thread ID (aka lightweight process ID) 475.It Cm time 476accumulated CPU time, user + system (alias 477.Cm cputime ) 478.It Cm tpgid 479control terminal process group ID 480.\".It Cm trss 481.\"text resident set size (in Kbytes) 482.It Cm tsess 483control terminal session pointer 484.It Cm tsig 485pending thread signals 486.It Cm tsiz 487text size (in Kbytes) 488.It Cm tt 489control terminal name (two letter abbreviation) 490.It Cm tty 491full name of control terminal 492.It Cm ucomm 493name to be used for accounting (alias 494.Cm comm ) 495.It Cm uid 496effective user ID 497.It Cm user 498user name (from uid) 499.It Cm vsz 500virtual size in Kbytes (alias 501.Cm vsize ) 502.It Cm wchan 503wait channel (as a symbolic name) 504.It Cm xstat 505exit or stop status (valid only for stopped or zombie process) 506.El 507.Sh FILES 508.Bl -tag -width ".Pa /boot/kernel/kernel" -compact 509.It Pa /dev/kmem 510default kernel memory 511.It Pa /boot/kernel/kernel 512default system namelist 513.It Pa /proc 514the mount point of 515.Xr procfs 5 516.El 517.Sh SEE ALSO 518.Xr kill 1 , 519.Xr w 1 , 520.Xr kvm 3 , 521.Xr strftime 3 , 522.Xr procfs 5 , 523.Xr pstat 8 , 524.Xr sysctl 8 525.Sh HISTORY 526The 527.Nm 528command appeared in 529.At v3 530in section 8 of the manual. 531.Sh BUGS 532Since 533.Nm 534cannot run faster than the system and is run as any other scheduled 535process, the information it displays can never be exact. 536