                                  pg_top
                             Version 3.7.0


              Frequently Asked Questions and their Answers



     GENERAL

 1.  What is pg_top? 

    pg_top is 'top' for PostgreSQL. It is derived from Unix Top. Similar to top,
    pg_top allows you to monitor PostgreSQL processes. It also allows you to:

    * View currently running SQL statement of a process.
    * View query plan of a currently running SELECT statement.
    * View locks held by a process.
    * View user table statistics.
    * View user index statistics.

 2.  Where do I get the latest version of pg_top? 

     If you have git, you can checkout the latest at:
     
     git clone git://git.postgresql.org/git/pg_top.git

 3.  Is there a web page for pg_top? 

     http://ptop.projects.postgresql.org/

 4.  Is there a mailing list or on-line bulletin board for pg_top? 

     Subscribe or browse the archives of ptop-hackers at:

     http://lists.pgfoundry.org/mailman/listinfo/ptop-hackers

 5.  What about Y2K/Year 2038 compliance? 

     A full statement concerning top and the year 2000 can be found in the file
     "Y2K" included with the distribution.

 6.  Will there be another major release of pg_top? Will there be a pg_top
     version 4? 

     We hope so!  Depends on how much fun we have. :)

 7.  We just upgraded our operating system to a new version and pg_top broke.
     What should we do? 

     Recompile it. pg_top is very sensitive to changes in internal kernel
     data structures. It is not uncommon for a new version of the
     operating system to include changes to kernel data structures.


     RUNNING

 8.  I just finished compiling top and it works fine for root, but when I
     try to run it as a regular user it either complains about files it
     can't open or it doesn't display all the information it should. Did I
     do something wrong? 

     Well, you're just not done. On many operating systems today, access
     to many of the kernel memory devices and other system files is
     restricted to either root or a particular group. The configure script
     figures this out (usually) and makes sure that the "install" rule in
     the Makefile will install top so that anyone can run it successfully.
     However, you have to *install* it first. Do this with the command
     "make install".

 9.  pg_top is (not) displaying idle processes and I don't (do) want it to. 

     This default has only changed about a dozen times, and I finally got
     tired of people whining about it. Go read the manual page for the
     current version and pay special attention to the description of the
     "PG_TOP" environment variable.

10.  The cpu state percentages are all wrong, indicating that my machine
     is using 95% system time when it is clearly idle. What's wrong? 

     This can happen if you compiled with gcc using the wrong include
     files. See the previous question.


     STILL STUCK

11.  I'm still stuck. To whom do I report problems with top?

     If after reading all of this file and checking everything you can you
     are still stuck, then please refer to the mailing to ask further
     questions:

     http://lists.pgfoundry.org/mailman/listinfo/ptop-hackers
