The w command

Yaser Rahmati | یاسر رحمتی

The w command displays information about the users that are currently active on the machine and their processes.

Examples:

  • Running the w command without arguments shows a list of logged on users and their processes.

[root@academy mydir]# w
 19:33:16 up  4:11,  2 users,  load average: 0.06, 0.10, 0.08
USER     TTY      FROM             LOGIN@   IDLE   JCPU   PCPU WHAT
root     pts/0    192.168.73.1     18:42    4.00s  0.56s  0.02s w
apa      pts/1    192.168.73.1     19:28    4:36   0.01s  0.01s -bash
[root@academy mydir]#
  • Show information for the user named apa.

[root@academy mydir]# w apa
 19:33:47 up  4:11,  2 users,  load average: 0.04, 0.09, 0.07
USER     TTY      FROM             LOGIN@   IDLE   JCPU   PCPU WHAT
apa      pts/1    192.168.73.1     19:28    5:07   0.01s  0.01s -bash
[root@academy mydir]#

Additional Information

The header of the output shows (in this order): the current time, how long the system has been running, how many users are currently logged on, and the system load averages for the past 1, 5, and 15 minutes.

The following entries are displayed for each user:

  • login name the tty

  • name the remote

  • host they are

  • logged in from the amount of time they are logged in their

  • idle time JCPU

  • PCPU

  • command line of their current process

The JCPU time is the time used by all processes attached to the tty. It does not include past background jobs, but does include currently running background jobs.

The PCPU time is the time used by the current process, named in the "what" field.

Additional Flags and their Functionalities:

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