PKILL(1)                   OpenBSD Reference Manual                   PKILL(1)

NAME
     pkill - find or signal processes by name

SYNOPSIS
     pgrep [-flnvx] [-G gid] [-P ppid] [-U uid] [-d delim] [-g pgrp] [-s sid]
           [-t tty] [-u euid] [pattern [...]]
     pkill [-signal] [-fnvx] [-G gid] [-P ppid] [-U uid] [-g pgrp] [-s sid]
           [-t tty] [-u euid] [pattern [...]]

DESCRIPTION
     The pgrep command searches the process table on the running system and
     prints the process IDs of all processes that match the criteria given on
     the command line.

     The pkill command searches the process table on the running system and
     signals all processes that match the criteria given on the command line.

     The following options are available:

     -G gid    Restrict matches to processes with a real group ID in the com-
               ma-separated list gid.

     -P ppid   Restrict matches to processes with a parent process ID in the
               comma-separated list ppid.

     -U uid    Restrict matches to processes with a real user ID in the comma-
               separated list uid.

     -d delim  Specify a delimiter to be printed between each process ID.  The
               default is a newline.  This option can only be used with the
               pgrep command.

     -f        Match against full argument lists.  The default is to match
               against process names.

     -g pgrp   Restrict matches to processes with a process group ID in the
               comma-separated list pgrp.  The value zero is taken to mean the
               process group ID of the running pgrep or pkill command.

     -l        Long output.  Print the process name in addition to the process
               ID for each matching process.  If used in conjunction with -f,
               print the process ID and the full argument list for each match-
               ing process.  This option can only be used with the pgrep com-
               mand.

     -n        Match only the most recently created process, if any.

     -s sid    Restrict matches to processes with a session ID in the comma-
               separated list sid.  The value zero is taken to mean the ses-
               sion ID of the running pgrep or pkill command.

     -t tty    Restrict matches to processes associated with a terminal in the
               comma-separated list tty.  Terminal names may be of the form
               `ttyxx' or the shortened form `xx'.  A single dash (`-') match-
               es processes not associated with a terminal.

     -u euid   Restrict matches to processes with an effective user ID in the
               comma-separated list euid.

     -v        Reverse the sense of the matching; display processes that do
               not match the given criteria.

     -x        Require an exact match of the process name, or argument list if
               -f is given.  The default is to match any substring.

     -signal   A non-negative decimal number or symbolic signal name specify-
               ing the signal to be sent instead of the default TERM.  This
               option is valid only when given as the first argument to pkill.

     Note that a running pgrep or pkill process will never consider itself nor
     system processes (kernel threads) as a potential match.

EXIT STATUS
     pgrep and pkill return one of the following values upon exit:

     0    One or more processes were matched.

     1    No processes were matched.

     2    Invalid options were specified on the command line.

     3    An internal error occurred.

SEE ALSO
     kill(1), ps(1), kill(2), sigaction(2), re_format(7)

HISTORY
     pkill and pgrep first appeared in OpenBSD 3.5.  They are modelled after
     utilities of the same name that appeared in Sun Solaris 7.

AUTHORS
     Andrew Doran <ad@NetBSD.org>.

OpenBSD 3.5                      March 1, 2002                               2
