PSTREE(1)                                                 User Commands                                                PSTREE(1)



NAME
       pstree - display a tree of processes

SYNOPSIS
       pstree [-a|--arguments] [-c|--compact] [-h|--highlight-all|-Hpid|--highlight-pid pid] [-l|--long] [-n|--numeric-sort]
       [-p|--show-pids] [-u|--uid-changes] [-Z|--security-context] [-A|--ascii|-G|--vt100|-U|--unicode] [pid|user]
       pstree -V|--version

DESCRIPTION
       pstree shows running processes as a tree. The tree is rooted at either pid or init if pid is omitted. If a user  name  is
       specified, all process trees rooted at processes owned by that user are shown.

       pstree  visually  merges  identical  branches  by  putting them in square brackets and prefixing them with the repetition
       count, e.g.

           init-+-getty
                |-getty
                |-getty
                `-getty

       becomes

           init---4*[getty]


       Child threads of a process are found under the parent process and are shown with the process name in curly braces, e.g.

           icecast2---13*[{icecast2}]


       If pstree is called as pstree.x11 then it will prompt the user at the end of the line to press return and will not return
       until that has happened. This is useful for when pstree is run in a xterminal.


OPTIONS
       -a     Show  command  line arguments. If the command line of a process is swapped out, that process is shown in parenthe-
              ses. -a implicitly disables compaction for processes but not threads.

       -A     Use ASCII characters to draw the tree.

       -c     Disable compaction of identical subtrees. By default, subtrees are compacted whenever possible.

       -G     Use VT100 line drawing characters.

       -h     Highlight the current process and its ancestors. This is a no-op if the terminal doesn't support  highlighting  or
              if neither the current process nor any of its ancestors are in the subtree being shown.

       -H     Like  -h,  but highlight the specified process instead. Unlike with -h, pstree fails when using -H if highlighting
              is not available.

       -l     Display long lines. By default, lines are truncated to the display width or 132 if output is sent to a non-tty  or
              if the display width is unknown.

       -n     Sort processes with the same ancestor by PID instead of by name. (Numeric sort.)

       -p     Show  PIDs.  PIDs are shown as decimal numbers in parentheses after each process name. -p implicitly disables com-
              paction.

       -u     Show uid transitions. Whenever the uid of a process differs from the uid of its parent, the new uid  is  shown  in
              parentheses after the process name.

       -U     Use  UTF-8  (Unicode)  line drawing characters. Under Linux 1.1-54 and above, UTF-8 mode is entered on the console
              with echo -e '\033%8' and left with echo -e '\033%@'

       -V     Display version information.

       -Z     (SELinux) Show security context for each process. This flag will only work if pstree  is  compilied  with  SELinux
              support.

FILES
       /proc     location of the proc file system

AUTHORS
       Werner Almesberger <wernerATalmesberger.net> Craig Small <csmallATsmall.au>

BUGS
       Some character sets may be incompatible with the VT100 characters.


SEE ALSO
       ps(1), top(1).



Linux                                                      2009-12-16                                                  PSTREE(1)