Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!gatech!uflorida!rex!ginosko!uunet!convex!tchrist@convex.UUCP
From: tchrist@convex.UUCP (Tom Christiansen)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: pid from process name
Keywords: pid
Message-ID: <1396@convex.UUCP>
Date: 15 Jul 89 14:06:24 GMT
References: <11723@drutx.ATT.COM>
Sender: tchrist@convex.UUCP
Reply-To: tchrist@convex.UUCP (Tom Christiansen)
Distribution: comp
Organization: CONVEX Technical Assistance Center, Richardson, TX
Lines: 12

In article <11723@drutx.ATT.COM> blum@drutx.ATT.COM (Mark Blumhardt) writes:
>Given a process name, how can I find its process id?   It just isn't
>obvious to me, other than a system call to grep thru the output of ps,
>which I don't want to do.

What is a "process name"?  You mean u.u_comm (basically *argv)?  That's 
hardy unique.  If you have control over the process you're interested in 
have it write its pid somewhere.  Otherwise you're going to have to 
do the 'ps|grep' thing unless you're up to a kernel dive, in which of 
course all things are possible but not all are expedient. :-)

--tom