View process statistics in realtime

top

A simple but effective replacement for ps aux. I used to waste my time running ps over and over; top is the way to go. It also allows complex sorting options. Press q to exit "nicely" (Ctrl + C is always an option, of course). Note that the list updates each second, resorting in the process; if you're trying to grab a specific PID, you might be better off with ps. htop Alternatively, htop is available, though it may not come pre-installed. htop is slightly more interactive than top and includes color coding, visuals, and a nice interface for selecting and then killing processes. (Thanks to bwoodacre for this great tool.)

Sample Output

top - 18:53:03 up 103 days, 13:10,  1 user,  load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00
Tasks:  46 total,   1 running,  45 sleeping,   0 stopped,   0 zombie
Cpu(s):  0.0% us,  0.0% sy,  0.0% ni, 100.0% id,  0.0% wa,  0.0% hi,  0.0% si
Mem:   4032280k total,   572900k used,  3459380k free,        0k buffers
Swap:        0k total,        0k used,        0k free,        0k cached

  PID USER      PR  NI  VIRT  RES  SHR S %CPU %MEM    TIME+  COMMAND
    1 root      16   0 10236  432  400 S    0  0.0   0:05.77 init
22204 root      15   0  5804  512  424 S    0  0.0   1:54.67 syslogd
24077 root      15   0 71696  712  664 S    0  0.0   0:00.00 cupsd
24565 root      15   0 55388  744  636 S    0  0.0   0:49.80 sshd
26154 root      16   0 21520  660  564 S    0  0.0   0:36.43 xinetd
26267 root      16   0 34164  516  464 S    0  0.0   0:00.00 couriertcpd
26271 root      17   0 26856  952  892 S    0  0.0   0:00.00 courierlogger
26283 root      21   0 34164  448  444 S    0  0.0   0:00.00 couriertcpd
26285 root      18   0 26724  740  736 S    0  0.0   0:00.00 courierlogger
26308 root      16   0 34164  516  464 S    0  0.0   0:03.94 couriertcpd
26311 root      16   0 26852  952  892 S    0  0.0   0:02.00 courierlogger
26329 root      21   0 34164  448  444 S    0  0.0   0:00.00 couriertcpd
26331 root      18   0 26720  740  736 S    0  0.0   0:00.00 courierlogger
 1800 named     15   0  140m 3556 1788 S    0  0.1   0:00.12 named
 5261 root      17   0 10648  648  428 S    0  0.0   0:00.00 mysqld_safe
 5423 mysql     16   0  221m  26m 5096 S    0  0.7  21:05.92 mysqld
 6129 root      16   0  112m 6300 3324 S    0  0.2   0:00.27 httpsd

-5

By: Zenexer

2009-03-18 00:03:42

top Process Management

Submit An Alternative

What Others Think

top is good. These days (under linux) I like htop more.

bwoodacre · 820 weeks and 2 days ago

Top has a nifty bunch of commands. Type "?" to see the list. "c" toggles command / command line (fu++ :-)

mpb · 820 weeks and 2 days ago

I love that alternative, bwoodacre; I just yum'd it. I'm going to edit it into the description. I doubt I'll ever type "top" again. ;)

Zenexer · 820 weeks and 2 days ago

Try htop also.

waltharius · 820 weeks and 1 day ago

waltharius: Yes, that's listed as an alternative. Many Linux systems do not have htop/vtop installed by default, however.

Zenexer · 820 weeks and 1 day ago

Top doesn't always cut it for me. I find myself using 'ps' and 'pstree' a lot (with various options that depend on what I'm looking for. If I'm in Slackware, I sometimes use 'socklist'...a similar command in the BSD world is 'sockstat'.

unixmonkey11373 · 746 weeks ago

seofox · 158 weeks and 6 days ago

rahimhh21 · 117 weeks and 2 days ago

pugpuppies95 · 71 weeks and 1 day ago

donperi1 · 64 weeks and 6 days ago

What do you think?

Any thoughts on this command? Does it work on your machine? Can you do the same thing with only 14 characters?

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