Question

I would like to find out if a process is running. I DO NOT want to use any system(“”) commands. Is there any C based function that lets you know if a process is running?

I would like to provide the process name and want to know if it’s running.

Thanks,

Answer 1

Sure, use kill(2):

 #include <sys/types.h>
 #include <signal.h>

 int kill(pid_t pid, int sig);

If sig is 0, then no signal is sent, but error checking is still performed; this can be used to check for the existence of a process ID or process group ID.

So just call kill(pid, 0) on the process ID of the process that you want to check for and see if you get an error (ESRCH).