I want to figure out which display a process is running on

drgowans · 11-07-2003, 12:29 PM

I'm using Redhat 9

I have a program that I wrote to run in HP-UX that will use ps, top, and who to look for a specific process, then pop up a warning message to the user if that process is using too much memory. It is written in python.

who -u prints the display(host) next to all the pts/# entries, but in Redhat 9 it doesn't:

who from Linux (Redhat 9) - note how the display (xt005:0.0, etc) isn't displayed...

image xt005:0 Nov 7 08:22 ? 32555 (xt005)
image pts/0 Nov 7 08:22 00:48 32650 (xt005:0.0)
image pts/1 Nov 7 08:27 02:55 32747
image xt011:0 Nov 7 08:35 ? 670 (xt011)
image pts/2 Nov 7 08:35 02:47 739
image :0 Nov 7 08:35 ? 593
image pts/3 Nov 7 08:35 02:47 776
image pts/4 Nov 7 08:37 . 807

who from HP-UX - note how it shows the host name and display for everything

image console Nov 5 15:25 old 28062 hpcam06
image ttyp1 Nov 7 07:44 old 9165 xt004:1.0
image dtremote Nov 4 22:28 old 3735 hpcam01:0
image dtremote Nov 7 07:44 old 9141 xt004:1
image ttyp2 Nov 5 15:25 old 28079 hpcam06:0.0
image pts/1 Nov 7 07:49 3:36 9231 xt004:1.0
image ttyp3 Nov 4 22:28 old 3752 hpcam01:0.0
image pts/2 Nov 7 08:58 2:27 9662 hpcam01:0.0
image ttyp4 Nov 7 07:49 old 9253 xt014:0.0
image pts/3 Nov 7 11:26 . 12868 lxcam08

How do I link a tty with a display? What other programs would give me the information I need?

Thanks!

jim mcnamara · 11-07-2003, 01:25 PM

ps -f shows the tty

Code:

ps -f
# you could restrict it to a comma-separated user list with -U 
ps -f -U `who -q | tr -s ' ' ','`  /* this returns all users */

jim mcnamara · 11-07-2003, 01:26 PM

PS:

ps -ef gives you EVERY process, some of which have no tty.

drgowans · 11-07-2003, 03:29 PM

I use ps -ef to get the tty, but I need to link the tty to the display.

For example, I have a process called 'get' running on pts/3 with process # 455. How do I use this information to find out the display, as in "<hostname>:#.#"?

Many thanks

drgowans · 11-10-2003, 11:32 AM

I understand that there isn't a direct correllation between a tty/pts, etc and a display, but no suggestions from anyone expect one person (and many thanks to that one person)?

Anyhow, for the future, I'll let everyone know how I had to do it.

I created a wrapper script for the graphical process I am attempting to track, which wrote to a log directory the process number and display variable when it launched the script.

The log program can then read the files in that directory, and hence there is a direct link between the process and the display it is running on. It then can use ps/top, etc to gather other information on the process.

So does nobody know of any system commands that will give the display/host of a process? It seems that it would be a fundamental piece of information that the kernel has to manage - why can't it be accessed?

Thanks!