7 .Nd display and update information about the top cpu processes
10 .Op Fl CHIPSTabijnpqtuvxz
22 processes on the system and periodically updates this information.
23 If standard output is an intelligent terminal (see below) then
24 as many processes as will fit on the terminal screen are displayed
26 Otherwise, a good number of them are shown (around 20).
27 Raw cpu percentage is used to rank the processes.
30 is given, then the top
32 processes will be displayed instead of the default.
35 makes a distinction between terminals that support advanced capabilities
36 and those that do not.
37 This distinction affects the choice of defaults for certain options.
38 In the remainder of this document, an \*(lqintelligent\*(rq terminal is one that
39 supports cursor addressing, clear screen, and clear to end of line.
40 Conversely, a \*(lqdumb\*(rq terminal is one that does not support such
44 is redirected to a file, it acts as if it were being run on a dumb
46 .Bl -tag -width indent -compact
48 Toggle CPU display mode.
49 By default top displays the weighted CPU percentage in the WCPU column
50 (this is the same value that
55 flag is passed it toggles between \*(lqraw cpu\*(rq mode
56 and \*(lqweighted cpu\*(rq mode, showing the \*(lqCPU\*(rq or
57 the \*(lqWCPU\*(rq column respectively.
59 Show system processes in the display.
60 Normally, system processes such as the pager and the swapper are not shown.
61 This option makes them visible.
63 Display command names derived from the argv[] vector, rather than real
65 It it useful when you want to watch applications, that
66 puts their status information there.
67 If the real name differs from argv[0],
68 it will be displayed in parenthesis.
70 Use \*(lqbatch\*(rq mode.
71 In this mode, all input from the terminal is
73 Interrupt characters (such as ^C and ^\e) still have an effect.
74 This is the default on a dumb terminal, or when the output is not a terminal.
76 Display each thread for a multithreaded process individually.
77 By default a single summary line is displayed for each process.
79 Use \*(lqinteractive\*(rq mode.
80 In this mode, any input is immediately
82 See the section on \*(lqInteractive Mode\*(rq
84 which keys perform what functions.
85 After the command is processed, the
86 screen will immediately be updated, even if the command was not
88 This mode is the default when standard output is an
91 Do not display idle processes.
92 By default, top displays both active and idle processes.
98 Toggle displaying thread ID (tid) instead of process id (pid).
104 Display either 'cpu' or 'io' statistics.
107 Use \*(lqnon-interactive\*(rq mode.
108 This is identical to \*(lqbatch\*(rq
111 Display per-cpu CPU usage statistics.
115 to -20 so that it will run faster.
116 This can be used when the system is
117 being very sluggish to improve the possibility of discovering the problem.
118 This option can only be used by root.
120 Do not map uid numbers to usernames.
123 will read as much of the file \*(lq/etc/passwd\*(rq as is necessary to map
124 all the user id numbers it encounters into login names.
125 This option disables all that, while possibly decreasing execution time.
126 The uid numbers are displayed instead of the names.
128 Write version number information to stderr then exit immediately.
130 Display approximate swap usage for each process.
132 Do not display the system idle process.
137 A display is considered to be one update of the
139 The default is 1 for dumb terminals.
143 no information is available about the percentage of time spent by the CPU in every state.
145 Set the delay between screen updates to
148 The default delay between updates is 1 second.
150 Sort the process display area on the specified field.
152 is the name of the column as seen in the output, but in lower case:
153 \*(lqcpu\*(lq, \*(rqsize\*(lq, \*(rqres\*(lq, \*(rqtime\*(lq,
154 \*(rqpri\*(lq, \*(rqthreads\*(lq, \*(lqtotal\*(lq, \*(rqread\*(lq,
155 \*(rqwrite\*(lq, \*(rqfault\*(lq, \*(rqvcsw\*(lq, \*(rqivcsw\*(lq,
156 \*(lqjid\*(lq, \*(rqswap\*(lq or \*(rqpid\*(lq.
158 Show only the process
161 Show only those processes owned by
163 This may be either the
170 to limit to host processes.
171 Using this option implies
175 Show only those processes owned by
177 This option currently only accepts usernames and will not understand
185 fields can be specified as \*(lqinfinite\*(rq, indicating that they can
186 stretch as far as possible.
187 This is accomplished by using any proper
188 prefix of the keywords
193 Boolean flags are toggles.
194 A second specification of any of these options will negate the first.
196 The display of command names changes according to the locale.
197 If command names displayed in the locale settings are recognized as
198 non-display characters, they are displayed in three digit octal sequence.
199 .Sh "INTERACTIVE MODE"
202 is running in \*(lqinteractive mode\*(rq, it reads commands from the
203 terminal and acts upon them accordingly.
204 In this mode, the terminal is
205 put in \*(lqCBREAK\*(rq, so that a character will be
206 processed as soon as it is typed.
207 Almost always, a key will be
210 is between displays; that is, while it is waiting for
213 If this is the case, the command will be
214 processed and the display will be updated immediately thereafter
215 (reflecting any changes that the command may have specified).
217 happens even if the command was incorrect.
218 If a key is pressed while
220 is in the middle of updating the display, it will finish the update and
221 then process the command.
222 Some commands require additional information,
223 and the user will be prompted accordingly.
224 While typing this information
225 in, the user's erase and kill keys (as set up by the command
227 are recognized, and a newline terminates the input.
229 These commands are currently recognized (^L refers to control-L):
230 .Bl -tag -width indent
234 Display a summary of the commands (help screen).
236 is included in this display.
241 Change the number of displays to show (prompt for new number).
242 Remember that the next display counts as one, so typing
246 show one final display and then immediately exit.
248 Toggle the display between 'cpu' and 'io' modes.
250 Change the number of processes to display (prompt for new number).
252 Change the number of seconds to delay between displays
253 (prompt for new number).
255 Toggle the display of system processes.
257 Toggle the display of process titles.
259 Send a signal (\*(lqkill\*(rq by default) to a list of processes.
260 This acts similarly to the command
263 Change the priority (the \*(lqnice\*(rq) of a list of processes.
264 This acts similarly to
267 Display only processes owned by a specific set of usernames (prompt for
269 If the username specified is simply \*(lq+\*(rq or \*(lq-\*(rq,
270 then processes belonging to all users will be displayed.
271 Usernames can be added
272 to and removed from the set by prepending them with \*(lq+\*(rq and
273 \*(lq-\*(rq, respectively.
275 Change the order in which the display is sorted.
276 The sort key names include
277 \*(lqcpu\*(rq, \*(lqres\*(rq, \*(lqsize\*(rq,
281 Display a specific process (prompt for pid).
282 If the pid specified is simply \*(lq+\*(rq, then show all processes.
284 Display a list of system errors (if any) generated by the last
287 Toggle the display of threads.
289 Toggle the display of idle processes.
291 Toggle the display of
295 Display only processes owned by a specific jail (prompt for jail).
296 If the jail specified is simply \*(lq+\*(rq, then processes belonging
297 to all jails and the host will be displayed.
298 This will also enable the display of JID.
300 Toggle the display of per-CPU statistics.
302 Toggle display of TID and PID
304 Toggle the display of the
308 Toggle the display of swap usage.
310 Toggle the display of the system idle process.
313 The top few lines of the display show general information
314 about the state of the system, including
315 the last process id assigned to a process (on most systems),
316 the three load averages,
318 the number of existing processes,
319 the number of processes in each state
320 (sleeping, running, starting, zombies, and stopped),
321 and a percentage of time spent in each of the processor states
322 (user, nice, system, and idle).
323 It also includes information about physical and virtual memory allocation.
325 The remainder of the screen displays information about individual
327 This display is similar in spirit to
329 but it is not exactly the same.
330 PID is the process id,
331 JID, when displayed, is the
333 ID corresponding to the process,
334 USERNAME is the name of the process's owner (if
336 is specified, a UID column will be substituted for USERNAME),
337 PRI is the current priority of the process,
341 SIZE is the total size of the process (text, data, and stack),
342 RES is the current amount of resident memory,
343 SWAP is the approximate amount of swap, if enabled
344 (SIZE, RES and SWAP are given in kilobytes),
345 STATE is the current state (one of \*(lqSTART\*(rq, \*(lqRUN\*(rq
346 (shown as \*(lqCPUn\*(rq on SMP systems), \*(lqSLEEP\*(rq, \*(lqSTOP\*(rq,
347 \*(lqZOMB\*(rq, \*(lqWAIT\*(rq, \*(lqLOCK\*(rq or the event on which the
349 C is the processor number on which the process is executing
350 (visible only on SMP systems),
351 TIME is the number of system and user cpu seconds that the process has used,
352 WCPU, when displayed, is the weighted cpu percentage (this is the same
356 CPU is the raw percentage and is the field that is sorted to determine
357 the order of the processes, and
358 COMMAND is the name of the command that the process is currently running
359 (if the process is swapped out, this column is marked \*(lq<swapped>\*(rq).
361 If a process is in the \*(lqSLEEP\*(rq or \*(lqLOCK\*(rq state,
362 the state column will report the name of the event or lock on which the
364 Lock names are prefixed with an asterisk \*(lq*\*(rq while sleep events
366 .Sh DESCRIPTION OF MEMORY
368 Mem: 61M Active, 86M Inact, 368K Laundry, 22G Wired, 102G Free
369 ARC: 15G Total, 9303M MFU, 6155M MRU, 1464K Anon, 98M Header, 35M Other
370 15G Compressed, 27G Uncompressed, 1.75:1 Ratio, 174M Overhead
371 Swap: 4096M Total, 532M Free, 13% Inuse, 80K In, 104K Out
373 .Ss Physical Memory Stats
374 .Bl -tag -width "Uncompressed" -compact
376 number of bytes active
378 number of clean bytes inactive
380 number of dirty bytes queued for laundering
382 number of bytes wired down, including IO-level cached file data pages
384 number of bytes used for IO-level disk caching
389 These stats are only displayed when the ARC is in use.
391 .Bl -tag -width "Uncompressed" -compact
393 number of wired bytes used for the ZFS ARC
395 number of ARC bytes holding most recently used data
397 number of ARC bytes holding most frequently used data
399 number of ARC bytes holding in flight data
401 number of ARC bytes holding headers
403 miscellaneous ARC bytes
405 bytes of memory used by ARC caches
407 bytes of data stored in ARC caches before compression
409 compression ratio of data cached in the ARC
412 .Bl -tag -width "Uncompressed" -compact
414 total available swap usage
416 total free swap usage
420 bytes paged in from swap devices (last interval)
422 bytes paged out to swap devices (last interval)
425 .Bl -tag -width "Uncompressed"
427 Default set of arguments to
435 .Xr humanize_number 3 ,
439 .An William LeFebvre, EECS Department, Northwestern University
441 The command name for swapped processes should be tracked down, but this
442 would make the program run slower.
446 things can change while
448 is collecting information for an update.
449 The picture it gives is only a close approximation to reality.