ps display thread name

Question

Is there a way for ps (or similar tool) to display the pthread's name? I wrote the following simple program:

// th_name.c
#include <stdio.h>
#include <pthread.h>

void * f1() {
    printf("f1 : Starting sleep\n");
    sleep(30);
    printf("f1 : Done sleep\n");
}

int main() {

    pthread_t  f1_thread;
    pthread_create(&f1_thread, NULL, f1, NULL);
    pthread_setname_np(f1_thread, "f1_thread");

    printf("Main : Starting sleep\n");
    sleep(40);
    printf("Main : Done sleep\n");
    return 0;

}

Is there a command/utility (like ps) that I can use to display the threads for the above program, along with their name.

$ /tmp/th_name > /dev/null &
[3] 2055
$ ps -eLf | egrep "th_name|UID"
UID        PID  PPID   LWP  C NLWP STIME TTY          TIME CMD
aal      31088 29342 31088  0    2 10:01 pts/4    00:00:00 /tmp/th_name
aal      31088 29342 31089  0    2 10:01 pts/4    00:00:00 /tmp/th_name
aal      31095 29342 31095  0    1 10:01 pts/4    00:00:00 egrep th_name|UID

I am running my program on Ubuntu 12.10.

osgx · Accepted Answer · 2017-06-26 02:16:06Z

23

With procps-ng (https://gitlab.com/procps-ng/procps) there are output option -L and -T which will print threads names:

$ ps -eL
$ ps -eT

-l long format may be used with them:

$ ps -eLl
$ ps -eTl

but -f option will replace thread name with full command line which is the same for all threads.

answered Jun 26, 2017 at 2:16

osgx

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Velkan · Accepted Answer · 2017-12-21 13:54:55Z

16

Show the thread IDs and names of the process with PID 12345:

ps H -o 'tid comm' 12345

answered Dec 21, 2017 at 13:54

Velkan

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vvy · Accepted Answer · 2013-07-08 01:25:55Z

note the man page of pthread_setname_np(),which have showed how to get the threads' names:

pthread_setname_np() internally writes to the thread specific comm file under /proc filesystem: /proc/self/task/[tid]/comm. pthread_getname_np() retrieves it from the same location.

and

Example

The program below demonstrates the use of pthread_setname_np() and pthread_getname_np().

The following shell session shows a sample run of the program:

$ ./a.out

Created a thread. Default name is: a.out

The thread name after setting it is THREADFOO.

^Z #Suspend the program

1+ Stopped ./a.out

$ ps H -C a.out -o 'pid tid cmd comm'

PID TID CMD COMMAND

5990 5990 ./a.out a.out

5990 5991 ./a.out THREADFOO

$ cat /proc/5990/task/5990/comm

a.out

$ cat /proc/5990/task/5991/comm

THREADFOO

kavadias · Accepted Answer · 2025-10-26 18:15:23Z

0

ps -eL -o pid,lwp,nlwp,comm,command

Shows:

pid: PID
lwp: Lightweight process ID
nlwp: number of lightweight processes
comm: thread name
command: full command executed

answered Oct 26 at 18:15

kavadias

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