pgrep(1) User Commands pgrep(1)NAME
pgrep, pkill - find or signal processes by name and other attributes
SYNOPSISpgrep [-flvx] [-n | -o] [-d delim] [-P ppidlist] [-g pgrplist]
[-s sidlist] [-u euidlist] [-U uidlist] [-G gidlist] [-J projidlist]
[-t termlist] [-T taskidlist] [-c ctidlist] [-z zoneidlist] [pattern]
pkill [-signal] [-fvx] [-n | -o] [-P ppidlist] [-g pgrplist]
[-s sidlist] [-u euidlist] [-U uidlist] [-G gidlist] [-J projidlist]
[-t termlist] [-T taskidlist] [-c ctidlist] [-z zoneidlist] [pattern]
DESCRIPTION
The pgrep utility examines the active processes on the system and
reports the process IDs of the processes whose attributes match the
criteria specified on the command line. Each process ID is printed as a
decimal value and is separated from the next ID by a delimiter string,
which defaults to a newline. For each attribute option, the user can
specify a set of possible values separated by commas on the command
line. For example,
pgrep-G other,daemon
matches processes whose real group ID is other OR daemon. If multiple
criteria options are specified, pgrep matches processes whose
attributes match the logical AND of the criteria options. For example,
pgrep-G other,daemon -U root,daemon
matches processes whose attributes are:
(real group ID is other OR daemon) AND
(real user ID is root OR daemon)
pkill functions identically to pgrep, except that each matching process
is signaled as if by kill(1) instead of having its process ID printed.
A signal name or number may be specified as the first command line
option to pkill.
OPTIONS
The following options are supported:
-c ctidlist Matches only processes whose process contract ID is in
the given list.
-d delim Specifies the output delimiter string to be printed
between each matching process ID. If no -d option is
specified, the default is a newline character. The -d
option is only valid when specified as an option to
pgrep.
-f The regular expression pattern should be matched
against the full process argument string (obtained from
the pr_psargs field of the /proc/nnnnn/psinfo file). If
no -f option is specified, the expression is matched
only against the name of the executable file (obtained
from the pr_fname field of the /proc/nnnnn/psinfo
file).
-g pgrplist Matches only processes whose process group ID is in the
given list. If group 0 is included in the list, this is
interpreted as the process group ID of the pgrep or
pkill process.
-G gidlist Matches only processes whose real group ID is in the
given list. Each group ID may be specified as either a
group name or a numerical group ID.
-J projidlist Matches only processes whose project ID is in the given
list. Each project ID may be specified as either a
project name or a numerical project ID.
-l Long output format. Prints the process name along with
the process ID of each matching process. The process
name is obtained from the pr_psargs or pr_fname field,
depending on whether the -f option was specified (see
above). The -l option is only valid when specified as
an option to pgrep.
-n Matches only the newest (most recently created) process
that meets all other specified matching criteria. Can‐
not be used with option -o.
-o Matches only the oldest (earliest created) process that
meets all other specified matching criteria. Cannot be
used with option -n.
-P ppidlist Matches only processes whose parent process ID is in
the given list.
-s sidlist Matches only processes whose process session ID is in
in the given list. If ID 0 is included in the list,
this is interpreted as the session ID of the pgrep or
pkill process.
-t termlist Matches only processes which are associated with a ter‐
minal in the given list. Each terminal is specified as
the suffix following "/dev/" of the terminal's device
path name in /dev. For example, term/a or pts/0.
-T taskidlist Matches only processes whose task ID is in the given
list. If ID 0 is included in the list, this is inter‐
preted as the task ID of the pgrep or pkill process.
-u euidlist Matches only processes whose effective user ID is in
the given list. Each user ID may be specified as either
a login name or a numerical user ID.
-U uidlist Matches only processes whose real user ID is in the
given list. Each user ID may be specified as either a
login name or a numerical user ID.
-v Reverses the sense of the matching. Matches all pro‐
cesses except those which meet the specified matching
criteria.
-x Considers only processes whose argument string or exe‐
cutable file name exactly matches the specified pattern
to be matching processes. The pattern match is consid‐
ered to be exact when all characters in the process
argument string or executable file name match the pat‐
tern.
-z zoneidlist Matches only processes whose zone ID is in the given
list. Each zone ID may be specified as either a zone
name or a numerical zone ID. This option is only useful
when executed in the global zone. If the pkill utility
is used to send signals to processes in other zones,
the process must have asserted the {PRIV_PROC_ZONE}
privilege (see privileges(5)).
-signal Specifies the signal to send to each matched process.
If no signal is specified, SIGTERM is sent by default.
The value of signal can be one of the symbolic names
defined in signal.h(3HEAD) without the SIG prefix, or
the corresponding signal number as a decimal value. The
-signal option is only valid when specified as the
first option to pkill.
OPERANDS
The following operand is supported:
pattern Specifies an Extended Regular Expression (ERE) pattern
to match against either the executable file name or
full process argument string. See regex(5) for a com‐
plete description of the ERE syntax.
EXAMPLES
Example 1: Obtaining a Process ID
Obtain the process ID of sendmail:
example% pgrep-x -u root sendmail
283
Example 2: Terminating a Process
Terminate the most recently created xterm:
example% pkill -n xterm
EXIT STATUS
The following exit values are returned:
0 One or more processes were matched.
1 No processes were matched.
2 Invalid command line options were specified.
3 A fatal error occurred.
FILES
/proc/nnnnn/psinfo Process information files
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:
┌─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┐
│ ATTRIBUTE TYPE │ ATTRIBUTE VALUE │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Availability │SUNWcsu │
└─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┘
SEE ALSOkill(1), proc(1), ps(1), truss(1), kill(2), signal.h(3HEAD), proc(4),
attributes(5), privileges(5), regex(5), zones(5)NOTES
Both utilities match the ERE pattern argument against either the
pr_fname or pr_psargs fields of the /proc/nnnnn/psinfo files. The
lengths of these strings are limited according to definitions in
<sys/procfs.h>. Patterns which can match strings longer than the cur‐
rent limits may fail to match the intended set of processes.
If the pattern argument contains ERE meta-characters which are also
shell meta-characters, it may be necessary to enclose the pattern with
appropriate shell quotes.
Defunct processes are never matched by either pgrep or pkill.
The current pgrep or pkill process will never consider itself a poten‐
tial match.
SunOS 5.10 6 May 2004 pgrep(1)
