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The Process Count Check monitor can be used to ensure an application is always running but to configure the monitor you must first identify the process name associated with the application.
Finding the process name assocated with an application is often as simple as locating the application in the Windows Task Manager. To find a Windows application's process name:
If the application you want to monitor is running as a Windows service (i.e. as a background process), it will typically not have a graphical front end and will not appear as an application in the Task Manager. To find a Windows service's process name:
Finding a process on a UNIX system depends on the application you want to monitor. Some applications do not need to be started with their actual name, some may rename themselves while running and some can start multiple processes while running. For example, with Oracle Database on UNIX, a process may exist for every database instance, whereas on Windows, a single process contains as many threads as there are database instances.
Given the less visibly direct association between UNIX processes and applications, you may need to use a utility to help you find the process you are looking for. Some examples include:
ps
: the process statistics command reports a snapshot of all currently running processes. For example, using "ps -ef
" produces a full listing of every running process.pstree
: this command is similar to ps
except processes are displayed in a tree view. Using this command can help you determine which process is associated with an application by easily identifying parent processes. You can also add an application username as an argument to only display process trees that belong to applications initiated by the supplied user name.pgrep
: this command expands on grep
(which is used to find text in files based on a matching pattern) by finding processes based on attributes such as the executable's name. A regular expression that is supplied as an argument is matched against executable file names associated with running processes (e.g. "pgrep payroll$
" would return all processes whose names end with "payroll"). If you have an idea of which application you are looking for, pgrep
returns a relatively refined list of results and is an ideal method.To create a service in Uptime Infrastructure Monitor: