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Abbreviations in the Output of the top Command

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In the top command output, abbreviations represent various metrics and system states. Here’s a breakdown:

System Summary Section:

  1. us: User CPU usage (time spent on non-kernel processes).
  2. sy: System CPU usage (time spent on kernel processes).
  3. ni: CPU time for processes with a manually set nice value.
  4. id: Idle CPU percentage.
  5. wa: CPU time waiting for I/O operations.
  6. hi: CPU time handling hardware interrupts.
  7. si: CPU time handling software interrupts.
  8. st: CPU time stolen by hypervisor.

Process Table Abbreviations:

  1. PID: Process ID.
  2. USER: User owning the process.
  3. PR: Process priority.
  4. NI: Niceness value (priority adjustment).
  5. VIRT: Virtual memory used by the process.
  6. RES: Resident memory (physical memory used).
  7. SHR: Shared memory used by the process.
  8. S: Process state (R: running, S: sleeping, etc.).
  9. %CPU: CPU usage by the process.
  10. %MEM: Memory usage by the process.
  11. TIME+: Total CPU time used by the process.
  12. COMMAND: Name/command of the process.

Would you like detailed examples or explanations for any specific abbreviation?