ps_mem(1)

📦
version 3.14 · 2 versions
, in alpine 3.24, centos-stream 10, fedora 43, fedora 44

💖 ps_mem — the memory profiling tool bestie 💖

okay so like, this is ps_mem(1), the manual for the memory profiling tool, and we're gonna get you so comfy with it. pull up a chair, grab a strawberry 🍓, and let's vibe check your RAM.

✨ NAME ✨

ps_mem — the memory profiling tool. that's it, that's the name, iconic. 👑

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

ps_mem [OPTION]...

yep. that's the whole thing. options go in, memory facts come out. slay.

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so what this actually does: it displays the core memory used per program — not per process, bestie, that distinction is doing so much heavy lifting here.

in detail it reports:

sum (private RAM for program processes) +
sum (shared RAM for program processes)

and now for the part that's giving main character energy: the shared RAM is genuinely problematic to calculate 😭, so the tool automatically picks the most accurate method available for the running kernel. it's out here adapting. it's flexible. we love that for it. ✨

🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

  • -h, --help — show the help message. literally just asks for help and it gives it to you. 🫶
  • --version — show version info. who are you? what are you? this tells you. 💅
  • -p PID[,PID2,...PIDN] — show memory consumption for the specified processes. you hand it a pid (or a whole little comma-separated list of them) and it tells you what they're eating. 🍽️
  • -S, --swap — show swap information of each item (and Shared swap too, but only if the kernel supports SwapPss). no cap, kernel-dependent. 🌈
  • -d, --discriminate-by-pid — show and separate memory usage entries by process rather than by program. the pettiest possible breakup of your memory usage. 🙈
  • -s, --split-args — show and separate memory usage entries by command line arguments, not just the program name. detail-oriented queen behavior. 👑
  • -t, --total — only display the total number of bytes for the selected processes. one number. no chaos. just the total. ⭐
  • -w N — report memory consumption every N seconds. it'll just keep checking in on you like a good friend. 🧚

💜 AUTHOR 💜

Pádraig Brady <P@draigBrady.com> — the legend who made all of this. we stan. 💖

and that's the whole page, bestie! every flag, every detail, every number — all here, all yours. go profile some memory. you're gonna do great. 🔥

this was ps_mem(1), from the 25 May 2018 era of the page itself — so like, vintage, but in a chic way 💅✨

📦 where this page comes from