topsys(1)

NAME
     topsys - display information about the top users of IRIX system services

SYNOPSIS
     topsys [-f] [-c cthresh] [-p pthresh] [-s samples] [-t interval] [-u
     uthresh]

DESCRIPTION
     topsys is a terminal based command for monitoring processes making large
     numbers of system calls, or spending a large percentage of their
     execution time in system mode.  A process will only be considered a
     candidate for display if it exceeds one of the thresholds specified by
     the -c, -p or -u options as described below.

     The -t option may used to set the delay between updates to interval.  The
     interval argument follows the syntax described in PCPIntro(1), and in the
     simplest form may be an unsigned integer (the implied units in this case
     are seconds).  The default is 5 seconds.

     By default topsys will run forever.  The -s option may be used to
     terminate execution after samples updates have been completed.  An
     optional "m" or "k" suffix can be used to multiply samples by 1000000 or
     1000 respectively.

     By default, topsys operates in ``curses mode'' (see below), but the -f
     option may be used to disable ``curses mode'' and cause output to be sent
     to the standard output without special control characters.  This option
     is usually used in conjunction with the -s option.

     The other options control the thresholds used to select processes of
     interest; a process is reported if at least one of the thresholds is
     exceeded in the update interval.

     -c   Specifies the threshold (cthresh) in terms of the minimum rate of
          system calls issued during the update interval.  The default is 100
          systems calls per second.

     -p   Specifies the threshold (pthresh) as the minimum percentage of
          accumulated CPU time (user plus system) that is attributed system
          time used by the process during the update interval.  The default is
          40%.

     -u   Specifies the threshold (uthresh) as the minimum total system time
          in seconds consumed by the process to date.  The default is 600
          seconds.

CURSES MODE
     By default, topsys runs in ``curses mode'' and the data displayed on the
     terminal is overwritten at the end of each update interval.  This display
     consists of the following columns:

     PID         the process ID of an "interesting" process

     COMMAND     up to 10 letters of a process' argv[0]
     USERNAME    up to 7 letters of a process' user name

     SCALL/S     system call rate (calls per second) during the update
                 interval

     DSYS        change (in milliseconds) in system time during the update
                 interval

     DSYS%       percentage of CPU time (user plus system) that is attributed
                 to system time during the update interval

     CPUTIME     total CPU time (user plus system) used by the process to
                 date, reported as minutes and seconds in the format MM:SS

     SYS         total system CPU time used by the process to date, reported
                 as minutes and seconds in the format MM:SS

     SYS%        percentage total CPU time (user plus system) used by the
                 process to date that is attributed to system time

     topsys displays the data about ``important'' processes in sorted order.
     The sort is on either ``DSYS'' (the default) or on ``SCALL/S''.  By
     pressing `s', the type of sort is switched.  Pressing any other key
     causes the display to be updated immediately.

     Note that processes which consume large amounts of system time with very
     few system calls may be exhibiting symptoms of kernel floating point
     emulation or floating point exceptions.

     Note also that processes with very high system call rates but small
     amounts of system time (or more specifically small amounts of system time
     per system call) are typically either calling lightweight system calls,
     e.g.  gettimeofday(3), lseek(2), getuid(2), etc., or spinning on
     incorrect error handling, e.g. mishandling end of file from read(2).

EXAMPLES
     topsys is usually invoked as follows:

          $ topsys


     This is the same as:

          $ topsys -t 5sec -u 600 -c 100 -p 40


     To see what various daemons are doing on a ``quiet'' system, one can use:

          $ topsys -c 1

SEE ALSO
     pmchart(1), topio(1) and top(1).

AUTHORS
     The original version of topsys was developed by Brian Sumner.