---
name: "Proc::ProcessTable"
section: "3pm"
platform: "linux"
package: "perl-proc-processtable"
version: "0.637-2"
release: "Arch Linux 2026-11-01"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/Proc::ProcessTable"
---

# Proc::ProcessTable(3pm)

Perl extension to access the unix process table

## NAME

Proc::ProcessTable - Perl extension to access the unix process table

## SYNOPSIS

```
  use Proc::ProcessTable;
  my $p = Proc::ProcessTable->new( 'cache_ttys' => 1 );
  my @fields = $p->fields;
  my $ref = $p->table;
```

## DESCRIPTION

Perl interface to the unix process table.

## METHODS

- new

  Creates a new ProcessTable object. The constructor can take the following flags:

  enable\_ttys -- causes the constructor to use the tty determination code, which is the default behavior.  Setting this to 0 disables this code, thus preventing the module from traversing the device tree, which on some systems, can be quite large and/or contain invalid device paths (for example, Solaris does not clean up invalid device entries when disks are swapped).  If this is specified with cache\_ttys, a warning is generated and the cache\_ttys is overridden to be false.

  cache\_ttys -- causes the constructor to look for and use a file that caches a mapping of tty names to device numbers, and to create the file if it doesn't exist. This feature requires the Storable module. By default, the cache file name consists of a prefix */tmp/TTYDEVS\_* and a byte order tag. The file name can be accessed (and changed) via `$Proc::ProcessTable::TTYDEVSFILE`.

- fields

  Returns a list of the field names supported by the module on the current architecture.

- table

  Reads the process table and returns a reference to an array of Proc::ProcessTable::Process objects. Attributes of a process object are returned by accessors named for the attribute; for example, to get the uid of a process just do:

  `$process`-\>uid

  The priority and pgrp methods also allow values to be set, since these are supported directly by internal perl functions.

## EXAMPLES

```
 # A cheap and sleazy version of ps
 use Proc::ProcessTable;
 my $FORMAT = "%-6s %-10s %-8s %-24s %s\n";
 my $t = Proc::ProcessTable->new;
 printf($FORMAT, "PID", "TTY", "STAT", "START", "COMMAND");
 foreach my $p ( @{$t->table} ){
   printf($FORMAT,
          $p->pid,
          $p->ttydev,
          $p->state,
          scalar(localtime($p->start)),
          $p->cmndline);
 }
 # Dump all the information in the current process table
 use Proc::ProcessTable;
 my $t = Proc::ProcessTable->new;
 foreach my $p (@{$t->table}) {
  print "--------------------------------\n";
  foreach my $f ($t->fields){
    print $f, ":  ", $p->{$f}, "\n";
  }
 }
```

## CAVEATS

Please see the file README in the distribution for a list of supported operating systems. Please see the file PORTING for information on how to help make this work on your OS.

## AUTHOR

J. Bargsten, D. Urist

## SEE ALSO

Proc::ProcessTable::Process, [**perl**(1)](/perl/1.md).