Process status utilities: ps pstat

Process status utilities: ps & pstat

On a lot of UNIX systems, you'll find that some of the status commands used regularly by system administrators can actually be used on postmortem files! This, however, is not always the case. If the commands appear to work, by all means use them!

For example, on Solaris 1 systems, the UNIX process status command, ps , can be used on the vmunix. X and vmcore. X files. To do this, after your favorite options append the ps -k option and specify the name of the vmunix and vmcore file. For example:

 ps -laxk vmunix.3 vmcore.3 

The Solaris 1 pstat command can also be used on your savecore files. No additional option is needed. For example:

 pstat -T vmunix.3 vmcore.3 

Neither of these commands exists for use against Solaris 2 crashes; however, as you'll soon see, other commands are available.