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Commandline 101: Using top

Mar 19, 2009  By Shawn Powers
 in
FAIL (the browser should render some flash content, not this).

How to use the top command.

Download in .ogv format

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top help

waparmley's picture
Submitted by waparmley on Wed, 03/25/2009 - 17:07.

I've used top many times, but always felt a bit confused by the interface. Press "h" for help ... wow, don't know why I never tried that. All I ever knew how to do was use < and >. Thanks for a great tech tip!

alternative

Tuxly_Tuxford_McTuxtington's picture
Submitted by Tuxly_Tuxford_M... on Thu, 03/19/2009 - 22:36.

Another good tip, Shawn!

Users may also want to check out htop, which is in the Ubuntu repositories. It's the same thing as top, just a bit prettier and (in my opinion) easier to grasp at a glance.

top and such

J. Hryko's picture
Submitted by J. Hryko (not verified) on Thu, 03/19/2009 - 19:33.

(i don't compile source but...)

it's great for newbies to get little chunks of info. baby steps. good work.

If you want to change the world, you have to do boring things.

Awesome Still

Shawn Powers's picture
Submitted by Shawn Powers on Thu, 03/19/2009 - 11:01.

I love the frame that blip.tv chose for the still frame. :D

"Press K to kill, but be careful!"

LOL

Shawn Powers is an Associate Editor for Linux Journal. You might find him chatting on the IRC channel, or Twitter

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