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Summary

psutil (python system and process utilities) is a cross-platform library for retrieving information on running processes and system utilization (CPU, memory, disks, network) in Python. It is useful mainly for system monitoring, profiling and limiting process resources and management of running processes. It implements many functionalities offered by command line tools such as: ps, top, lsof, netstat, ifconfig, who, df, kill, free, nice, ionice, iostat, iotop, uptime, pidof, tty, taskset, pmap. It currently supports Linux, Windows, OSX, FreeBSD and Sun Solaris, both 32-bit and 64-bit architectures, with Python versions from 2.4 to 3.4. Pypi is also known to work.

Example applications

Example usages

CPU

>>> import psutil
>>> psutil.cpu_times()
scputimes(user=3961.46, nice=169.729, system=2150.659, idle=16900.540, iowait=629.59, irq=0.0, softirq=19.42, steal=0.0, guest=0, nice=0.0)
>>>
>>> for x in range(3):
...     psutil.cpu_percent(interval=1)
...
4.0
5.9
3.8
>>>
>>> for x in range(3):
...     psutil.cpu_percent(interval=1, percpu=True)
...
[4.0, 6.9, 3.7, 9.2]
[7.0, 8.5, 2.4, 2.1]
[1.2, 9.0, 9.9, 7.2]
>>>
>>>
>>> for x in range(3):
...     psutil.cpu_times_percent(interval=1, percpu=False)
...
scputimes(user=1.5, nice=0.0, system=0.5, idle=96.5, iowait=1.5, irq=0.0, softirq=0.0, steal=0.0, guest=0.0, guest_nice=0.0)
scputimes(user=1.0, nice=0.0, system=0.0, idle=99.0, iowait=0.0, irq=0.0, softirq=0.0, steal=0.0, guest=0.0, guest_nice=0.0)
scputimes(user=2.0, nice=0.0, system=0.0, idle=98.0, iowait=0.0, irq=0.0, softirq=0.0, steal=0.0, guest=0.0, guest_nice=0.0)
>>>
>>> psutil.cpu_count()
4
>>> psutil.cpu_count(logical=False)
2
>>>

Memory

>>> psutil.virtual_memory()
svmem(total=8374149120L, available=2081050624L, percent=75.1, used=8074080256L, free=300068864L, active=3294920704, inactive=1361616896, buffers=529895424L, cached=1251086336)
>>> psutil.swap_memory()
sswap(total=2097147904L, used=296128512L, free=1801019392L, percent=14.1, sin=304193536, sout=677842944)
>>>

Disks

>>> psutil.disk_partitions()
[sdiskpart(device='/dev/sda1', mountpoint='/', fstype='ext4', opts='rw,nosuid'),
 sdiskpart(device='/dev/sda2', mountpoint='/home', fstype='ext, opts='rw')]
>>>
>>> psutil.disk_usage('/')
sdiskusage(total=21378641920, used=4809781248, free=15482871808, percent=22.5)
>>>
>>> psutil.disk_io_counters(perdisk=False)
sdiskio(read_count=719566, write_count=1082197, read_bytes=18626220032, write_bytes=24081764352, read_time=5023392, write_time=63199568)
>>>

Network

>>> psutil.net_io_counters(pernic=True)
{'eth0': netio(bytes_sent=485291293, bytes_recv=6004858642, packets_sent=3251564, packets_recv=4787798, errin=0, errout=0, dropin=0, dropout=0),
 'lo': netio(bytes_sent=2838627, bytes_recv=2838627, packets_sent=30567, packets_recv=30567, errin=0, errout=0, dropin=0, dropout=0)}
>>>
>>> psutil.net_connections()
[pconn(fd=115, family=2, type=1, laddr=('10.0.0.1', 48776), raddr=('93.186.135.91', 80), status='ESTABLISHED', pid=1254),
 pconn(fd=117, family=2, type=1, laddr=('10.0.0.1', 43761), raddr=('72.14.234.100', 80), status='CLOSING', pid=2987),
 pconn(fd=-1, family=2, type=1, laddr=('10.0.0.1', 60759), raddr=('72.14.234.104', 80), status='ESTABLISHED', pid=None),
 pconn(fd=-1, family=2, type=1, laddr=('10.0.0.1', 51314), raddr=('72.14.234.83', 443), status='SYN_SENT', pid=None)
 ...]

Other system info

>>> psutil.users()
[user(name='giampaolo', terminal='pts/2', host='localhost', started=1340737536.0),
 user(name='giampaolo', terminal='pts/3', host='localhost', started=1340737792.0)]
>>>
>>> psutil.boot_time()
1365519115.0
>>>

Process management

>>> import psutil
>>> psutil.pids()
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 46, 48, 50, 51, 178, 182, 222, 223, 224,
 268, 1215, 1216, 1220, 1221, 1243, 1244, 1301, 1601, 2237, 2355,
 2637, 2774, 3932, 4176, 4177, 4185, 4187, 4189, 4225, 4243, 4245,
 4263, 4282, 4306, 4311, 4312, 4313, 4314, 4337, 4339, 4357, 4358,
 4363, 4383, 4395, 4408, 4433, 4443, 4445, 4446, 5167, 5234, 5235,
 5252, 5318, 5424, 5644, 6987, 7054, 7055, 7071]
>>>
>>> p = psutil.Process(7055)
>>> p.name()
'python'
>>> p.exe()
'/usr/bin/python'
>>> p.cwd()
'/home/giampaolo'
>>> p.cmdline()
['/usr/bin/python', 'main.py']
>>>
>>> p.status()
'running'
>>> p.username()
'giampaolo'
>>> p.create_time()
1267551141.5019531
>>> p.terminal()
'/dev/pts/0'
>>>
>>> p.uids()
puids(real=1000, effective=1000, saved=1000)
>>> p.gids()
pgids(real=1000, effective=1000, saved=1000)
>>>
>>> p.cpu_times()
pcputimes(user=1.02, system=0.31)
>>> p.cpu_percent(interval=1.0)
12.1
>>> p.cpu_affinity()
[0, 1, 2, 3]
>>> p.cpu_affinity([0])  # set
>>>
>>> p.memory_percent()
0.63423
>>>
>>> p.memory_info()
pmem(rss=7471104, vms=68513792)
>>> p.ext_memory_info()
extmem(rss=9662464, vms=49192960, shared=3612672, text=2564096, lib=0, data=5754880, dirty=0)
>>> p.memory_maps()
[pmmap_grouped(path='/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libutil-2.15.so', rss=16384, anonymous=8192, swap=0),
 pmmap_grouped(path='/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libc-2.15.so', rss=6384, anonymous=15, swap=0),
 pmmap_grouped(path='/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libcrypto.so.1.0.0', rss=34124, anonymous=1245, swap=0),
 pmmap_grouped(path='[heap]', rss=54653, anonymous=8192, swap=0),
 pmmap_grouped(path='[stack]', rss=1542, anonymous=166, swap=0),
 ...]
>>>
>>> p.io_counters()
pio(read_count=478001, write_count=59371, read_bytes=700416, write_bytes=69632)
>>>
>>> p.open_files()
[popenfile(path='/home/giampaolo/svn/psutil/somefile', fd=3)]
>>>
>>> p.connections()
[pconn(fd=115, family=2, type=1, laddr=('10.0.0.1', 48776), raddr=('93.186.135.91', 80), status='ESTABLISHED'),
 pconn(fd=117, family=2, type=1, laddr=('10.0.0.1', 43761), raddr=('72.14.234.100', 80), status='CLOSING'),
 pconn(fd=119, family=2, type=1, laddr=('10.0.0.1', 60759), raddr=('72.14.234.104', 80), status='ESTABLISHED'),
 pconn(fd=123, family=2, type=1, laddr=('10.0.0.1', 51314), raddr=('72.14.234.83', 443), status='SYN_SENT')]
>>>
>>> p.num_threads()
4
>>> p.num_fds()
8
>>> p.threads()
[pthread(id=5234, user_time=22.5, system_time=9.2891),
 pthread(id=5235, user_time=0.0, system_time=0.0),
 pthread(id=5236, user_time=0.0, system_time=0.0),
 pthread(id=5237, user_time=0.0707, system_time=1.1)]
>>>
>>> p.num_ctx_switches()
pctxsw(voluntary=78, involuntary=19)
>>>
>>> p.nice()
0
>>> p.nice(10)  # set
>>>
>>> p.ionice(psutil.IOPRIO_CLASS_IDLE)  # IO priority (Win and Linux only)
>>> p.ionice()
pionice(ioclass=3, value=0)
>>>
>>> p.rlimit(psutil.RLIMIT_NOFILE, (5, 5))  # set resource limits (Linux only)
>>> p.rlimit(psutil.RLIMIT_NOFILE)
(5, 5)
>>>
>>> p.suspend()
>>> p.resume()
>>>
>>> p.terminate()
>>> p.wait(timeout=3)
0
>>>
>>> psutil.test()
USER         PID %CPU %MEM     VSZ     RSS TTY        START    TIME  COMMAND
root           1  0.0  0.0   24584    2240            Jun17   00:00  init
root           2  0.0  0.0       0       0            Jun17   00:00  kthreadd
root           3  0.0  0.0       0       0            Jun17   00:05  ksoftirqd/0
...
giampaolo  31475  0.0  0.0   20760    3024 /dev/pts/0 Jun19   00:00  python2.4
giampaolo  31721  0.0  2.2  773060  181896            00:04   10:30  chrome
root       31763  0.0  0.0       0       0            00:05   00:00  kworker/0:1
>>>

Further process APIs

>>> for p in psutil.process_iter():
...     print(p)
...
psutil.Process(pid=1, name='init')
psutil.Process(pid=2, name='kthreadd')
psutil.Process(pid=3, name='ksoftirqd/0')
...
>>>
>>> def on_terminate(proc):
...     print("process {} terminated".format(proc))
...
>>> # waits for multiple processes to terminate
>>> gone, alive = psutil.wait_procs(procs_list, 3, callback=on_terminate)
>>>

Donate

A lot of time and effort went into making psutil as it is right now. If you feel psutil is useful to you or your business and want to support its future development please consider donating me (Giampaolo Rodola’) some money. I only ask for a small donation, but of course I appreciate any amount.

Don’t want to donate money? Then maybe you could write me a recommendation on Linkedin.

Mailing list

http://groups.google.com/group/psutil/

Timeline

2014-04-30: psutil-2.1.1.tar.gz

2014-04-08: psutil-2.1.0.tar.gz

2014-03-10: psutil-2.0.0.tar.gz

2013-11-25: psutil-1.2.1.tar.gz

2013-11-20: psutil-1.2.0.tar.gz

2013-11-07: psutil-1.1.3.tar.gz

2013-10-22: psutil-1.1.2.tar.gz

2013-10-08: psutil-1.1.1.tar.gz

2013-09-28: psutil-1.1.0.tar.gz

2013-07-12: psutil-1.0.1.tar.gz

2013-07-10: psutil-1.0.0.tar.gz

2013-05-03: psutil-0.7.1.tar.gz

2013-04-12: psutil-0.7.0.tar.gz

2012-08-16: psutil-0.6.1.tar.gz

2012-08-13: psutil-0.6.0.tar.gz

2012-06-29: psutil-0.5.1.tar.gz

2012-06-27: psutil-0.5.0.tar.gz

2011-12-14: psutil-0.4.1.tar.gz

2011-10-29: psutil-0.4.0.tar.gz

2011-07-08: psutil-0.3.0.tar.gz

2011-03-20: psutil-0.2.1.tar.gz

2010-11-13: psutil-0.2.0.tar.gz

2010-03-02: psutil-0.1.3.tar.gz

2009-05-06: psutil-0.1.2.tar.gz

2009-03-06: psutil-0.1.1.tar.gz

2009-01-27: psutil-0.1.0.tar.gz

Metadata

Release files for psutil 2.1.1

For a detailed explanation of source distributions (sdists) and built distributions (wheels), please see the package formats documentation.

Source distribution (sdist)

Source distribution for psutil 2.1.1
File	Size	Uploaded
psutil-2.1.1.tar.gz	216.8 kB	Apr 30, 2014	Details

Built distributions (wheels)

Table of built distributions (wheels) for psutil 2.1.1
File	Interpreter	ABI	Platform	Reset
psutil-2.1.1.win-amd64-py3.4.exe 312.4 kB Apr 30, 2014				Details
psutil-2.1.1.win-amd64-py3.3.exe 311.3 kB Apr 30, 2014				Details
psutil-2.1.1.win-amd64-py2.7.exe 312.8 kB Apr 30, 2014				Details
psutil-2.1.1.win32-py3.4.exe 279.1 kB Apr 30, 2014				Details
psutil-2.1.1.win32-py3.3.exe 277.9 kB Apr 30, 2014				Details
psutil-2.1.1.win32-py2.7.exe 282.9 kB Apr 30, 2014				Details
psutil-2.1.1.win32-py2.6.exe 283.1 kB Apr 30, 2014				Details
psutil-2.1.1.win32-py2.5.exe 150.0 kB Apr 30, 2014				Details
psutil-2.1.1.win32-py2.4.exe 145.8 kB Apr 30, 2014				Details

Total release size: 2.6 MB

Release files / psutil-2.1.1.tar.gz

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