Questions tagged [process]

A process is a binary program running continuously on a computer (until terminated) which is managed by the operating system.

A process is a binary program running continuously on a computer (until terminated) which is managed by the operating system. A particular process may run multiple execution threads, but the flow of logic is generally directed by the main processes' thread.

The process executes on the CPU when the operating system's process scheduler determines that it should run. There are a wide variety of methods and algorithms used in operating systems to determine when to execute the next group of instructions in a particular process.

These schedules differ from operating system to operating system (or even in different versions). For example, the Linux kernel's process scheduler was changed from version 2.4 to 2.6.

1371 questions
1212
votes
14 answers

Find out which process is locking a file or folder in Windows

How can I find out which process is locking a file or folder in Windows? For instance, when trying to delete a folder, Windows reports this: The action can't be completed because the folder is open in another program Happens the same with a file,…
leeand00
  • 21,508
  • 43
  • 120
  • 182
350
votes
11 answers

If I know the PID number of a process, how can I get its name?

If I have the PID number for a process (on a UNIX machine), how can I find out the name of its associated process? What do I have to do?
AndreaNobili
  • 6,981
  • 14
  • 37
  • 46
163
votes
1 answer

Why are there no odd Windows process IDs?

There are many ways to examine process IDs in Windows. For example, using the PowerShell command: ps | select Id, ProcessName | Sort Id | ft -AutoSize We see the following output: Id ProcessName -- ----------- 0 Idle …
Peter Hahndorf
  • 13,370
  • 9
  • 51
  • 67
151
votes
8 answers

How can I know the absolute path of a running process?

If I have multiple copies of the same application on the disk, and only one is running, as I can see with ps, how can I know the absolute path to distinguish it from the others?
Jader Dias
  • 15,756
  • 60
  • 143
  • 196
129
votes
4 answers

What is effect of CTRL + Z on a unix\Linux application

I was curious and confused that what exactly is the behaviour of CTRl+Z. I know, If a process in running in foreground, and we press ctrl+z`, it goes to background. But what exactly happens?. Does it keep doing it's job?, or does it get suspended?,…
Kumar Alok
  • 1,563
  • 3
  • 11
  • 10
122
votes
10 answers

How to get parent PID of a given process in GNU/Linux from command line?

Resolved before asked: cat /proc/1111/status | grep PPid
Vi.
  • 16,755
  • 32
  • 111
  • 189
111
votes
2 answers

How to stop a process in Terminal

Possible Duplicate: Ending a process in unix instead of interrupting it When I task in Terminal, such as ping blah.com, how do I then stop this task (other than closing the Terminal window. In Windows, you can Ctrl+Break pretty much any terminal…
AngryHacker
  • 18,217
  • 67
  • 156
  • 209
107
votes
16 answers

How can I trigger a notification when a job/process ends?

The place I work at has commands that take a long time to execute. Is there a command/utility that I can use to notify me when the command execution is over? It could be a popup window or maybe a little sound.
Utkarsh Sinha
  • 1,557
  • 2
  • 16
  • 18
92
votes
8 answers

How to find uptime of a linux process

How do I find the uptime of a given linux process. ps aux | grep gedit | grep -v grep gives me a whole lot of information which includes the time at which the process was started. I am specifically looking for switch which returns the uptime of a…
Mahadevan Sreenivasan
  • 1,023
  • 1
  • 8
  • 6
91
votes
7 answers

Why does WMI Provider Host (WmiPrvSE.exe) keep spiking my CPU?

I generally keep my laptop on 24x7, and at the end of the day it's really annoying to have my thighs burnt because over overheating. The overheating seems to be a result of WMI Provider Host (WmiPrvSE.exe) spiking the CPU utilization to 25% every…
Sathyajith Bhat
  • 61,504
  • 38
  • 179
  • 264
91
votes
4 answers

Difference between "a=b" and "export a=b" in bash

What's the difference between: a=b and export a=b In bash? I understand that they both define environment variables, but I don't fully understand the difference.
Adam Matan
  • 8,090
  • 17
  • 59
  • 84
84
votes
2 answers

run powershell command from cmd

how i can run this command from cmd : powershell.exe "(get-process | ? {$_.Description -eq "Sysinter Process Explorer"}) | select processname | out-file $env:APPDATA\example.txt" i still get this error : You must provide a value expression on…
Qassam Mahmoud
  • 993
  • 1
  • 8
  • 10
81
votes
4 answers

Why is the CPU usage reported by top in Linux over 100%?

I've seen the CPU usage go over 100%. How is this possible? Is it because I have four CPU cores, so 100% isn't really the max? Also, when a program does this, what else can I do in top besides using the k command?
tony_sid
  • 14,001
  • 51
  • 139
  • 194
76
votes
6 answers

What's the difference between docker.io and docker?

Trying to learn docker here but I am a bit confused on what the difference is between docker.io and docker. Is docker.io the daemon server and docker the client? Why does the daemon need to run all the time?
Pithikos
  • 1,564
  • 2
  • 15
  • 20
73
votes
6 answers

Is there any way to set the priority of a process in Mac OS X?

I have a background process running at 100% CPU on Mac OS X. All other applications are very slow because of it. I'd like to set this process to take no more than 50% so that my applications can run better. How can I do this?
Daniel Cukier
  • 3,880
  • 10
  • 38
  • 48
1
2 3
91 92