4.2 Process group definition

Process group is a set of processes with the program name matching a certain pattern. The process group is identified by its name and is represented in the MIB by the processGroupTable hierarchy, which keeps summary statistics for all processes in the group.

Process groups are declared using the group statement.

Config: group name

Create a process group name. This statement should be followed by one or more of the substatements described below, which will configure details of that group.

Config: pattern string

Defines the pattern that the name of a process must match in order for that process to be included in the group. Defaults to the name argument of the group statement.

Config: field fn

Specifies what to match against the pattern. The fn argument is one of:

comm

Stands for the argv[0] value. This is the default.

exe

Full pathname of the executable file.

cmdline

Entire command line.

Config: match type

Specifies how to match the selected field against the pattern. The argument can be one of:

exact

Byte-to-byte comparison. This is the default.

basename

Compare only the base names of pattern and field value.

regex

rx

Treat pattern as an extended regular expression.

Config: min n

Sets the minimum allowed number of running processes in the group.

Config: max n

Sets the maximum allowed number of running processes in the group.

Config: vsize size

Sets the maximum total usage of virtual memory for the group, in kilobytes. Optional size suffixes are allowed: k for kilobytes (the default), m for megabytes, and g for gigabytes (uppercase letters are also allowed).

If the sum of virtual memory used by each process in the group becomes greater than size, then the corresponding processGroupOK instance will be set to false.

Config: rss size

Sets the maximum total resident set size. The size argument can be followed by one of the suffixes k, m, or g, described above. The default is k. If the sum of resident set size used by all processes in the group becomes greater than size, then the corresponding processGroupOK instance will be set to false.

Config: cpu pct

Sets the maximum CPU usage for the group, in percent. If total CPU usage by all processes in the group becomes greater than pct, then the corresponding processGroupOK instance will be set to false.

An example of the group declaration:

  group prosody
    field cmdline
    match rx
    pattern lua .*/prosody$
    min 1
    max 1

For compatibility with snmpd a simplified declaration is allowed:

Config: proc name [max] [min]

Create a process group name. The group will include processes with the process name (argv[0]) name. The max and min parameters define maximum and minimum allowed number of running processes for that group. If the number of processes in the group becomes less than min or greater than max, then the corresponding processGroupOK instance will be set to false.

If neither max nor min are specified, they will default to infinity and 1 respectively (“at least one”). If only max is specified, min will default to 0 (“no more than max”). If max is 0 and min is not, this indicates infinity (“at least min”). If both max and min are 0, this indicates a process that should not be running.

The proc statement is equivalent to:

  group name
    pattern name
    field comm
    match exact
    min min
    max max