commandliners

You probably use the ps command a lot, but sometimes there is too much info, and somewhat disordered. It can be easily ordered with the forest option, as the following example shows:

$ ps -e -o pid,args --forest
  PID COMMAND
    2 [kthreadd]
    3  \_ [migration/0]
    4  \_ [ksoftirqd/0]
    5  \_ [watchdog/0]

[...]

    1 /sbin/init
 2742 /sbin/udevd --daemon

[...]

 6307 /usr/sbin/gdm
 6310  \_ /usr/sbin/gdm
 6313      \_ /usr/bin/X :0 -br -audit 0 -auth /var/lib/gdm/:0.Xauth -nolisten tcp vt7
 6514      \_ x-session-manager
 6623          \_ /usr/bin/seahorse-agent --execute x-session-manager
 6632          \_ gnome-settings-daemon
 6636          |   \_ /usr/bin/pulseaudio --log-target=syslog
 6640          |       \_ /usr/lib/pulseaudio/pulse/gconf-helper
 6654          \_ /bin/sh /usr/bin/compiz --sm-client-id default0
 6720          |   \_ /usr/bin/compiz.real --ignore-desktop-hints --replace --indirect-rendering --sm-client-id default0 core ccp
 6775          |       \_ /bin/sh -c /usr/bin/compiz-decorator
 6776          |           \_ /bin/sh /usr/bin/compiz-decorator
 6778          |               \_ /usr/bin/gtk-window-decorator
 6656          \_ gnome-panel --sm-client-id default1
 6657          \_ nautilus --no-default-window --sm-client-id default2
 6724          \_ update-notifier
 6730          \_ tracker-applet
 6732          \_ trackerd
 6735          \_ python /usr/share/system-config-printer/applet.py
 6737          \_ nm-applet --sm-disable
 6352 /usr/sbin/atd

[...]

The above command shows (as you see) a hierarchic list of processes, with just the PID and COMMAND columns.