How to determine CPU and memory consumption from inside a process?

Lanzelot picture Lanzelot · Sep 15, 2008 · Viewed 324.2k times · Source

I once had the task of determining the following performance parameters from inside a running application:

  • Total virtual memory available
  • Virtual memory currently used
  • Virtual memory currently used by my process
  • Total RAM available
  • RAM currently used
  • RAM currently used by my process
  • % CPU currently used
  • % CPU currently used by my process

The code had to run on Windows and Linux. Even though this seems to be a standard task, finding the necessary information in the manuals (WIN32 API, GNU docs) as well as on the Internet took me several days, because there's so much incomplete/incorrect/outdated information on this topic to be found out there.

In order to save others from going through the same trouble, I thought it would be a good idea to collect all the scattered information plus what I found by trial and error here in one place.

Answer

Lanzelot picture Lanzelot · Sep 15, 2008

Windows

Some of the above values are easily available from the appropriate WIN32 API, I just list them here for completeness. Others, however, need to be obtained from the Performance Data Helper library (PDH), which is a bit "unintuitive" and takes a lot of painful trial and error to get to work. (At least it took me quite a while, perhaps I've been only a bit stupid...)

Note: for clarity all error checking has been omitted from the following code. Do check the return codes...!


  • Total Virtual Memory:

    #include "windows.h"
    
    MEMORYSTATUSEX memInfo;
    memInfo.dwLength = sizeof(MEMORYSTATUSEX);
    GlobalMemoryStatusEx(&memInfo);
    DWORDLONG totalVirtualMem = memInfo.ullTotalPageFile;
    

    Note: The name "TotalPageFile" is a bit misleading here. In reality this parameter gives the "Virtual Memory Size", which is size of swap file plus installed RAM.

  • Virtual Memory currently used:

    Same code as in "Total Virtual Memory" and then

     DWORDLONG virtualMemUsed = memInfo.ullTotalPageFile - memInfo.ullAvailPageFile;
    
  • Virtual Memory currently used by current process:

    #include "windows.h"
    #include "psapi.h"
    
    PROCESS_MEMORY_COUNTERS_EX pmc;
    GetProcessMemoryInfo(GetCurrentProcess(), (PROCESS_MEMORY_COUNTERS*)&pmc, sizeof(pmc));
    SIZE_T virtualMemUsedByMe = pmc.PrivateUsage;
    



  • Total Physical Memory (RAM):

    Same code as in "Total Virtual Memory" and then

    DWORDLONG totalPhysMem = memInfo.ullTotalPhys;
    
  • Physical Memory currently used:

    Same code as in "Total Virtual Memory" and then

    DWORDLONG physMemUsed = memInfo.ullTotalPhys - memInfo.ullAvailPhys;
    
  • Physical Memory currently used by current process:

    Same code as in "Virtual Memory currently used by current process" and then

    SIZE_T physMemUsedByMe = pmc.WorkingSetSize;
    



  • CPU currently used:

    #include "TCHAR.h"
    #include "pdh.h"
    
    static PDH_HQUERY cpuQuery;
    static PDH_HCOUNTER cpuTotal;
    
    void init(){
        PdhOpenQuery(NULL, NULL, &cpuQuery);
        // You can also use L"\\Processor(*)\\% Processor Time" and get individual CPU values with PdhGetFormattedCounterArray()
        PdhAddEnglishCounter(cpuQuery, L"\\Processor(_Total)\\% Processor Time", NULL, &cpuTotal);
        PdhCollectQueryData(cpuQuery);
    }
    
    double getCurrentValue(){
        PDH_FMT_COUNTERVALUE counterVal;
    
        PdhCollectQueryData(cpuQuery);
        PdhGetFormattedCounterValue(cpuTotal, PDH_FMT_DOUBLE, NULL, &counterVal);
        return counterVal.doubleValue;
    }
    
  • CPU currently used by current process:

    #include "windows.h"
    
    static ULARGE_INTEGER lastCPU, lastSysCPU, lastUserCPU;
    static int numProcessors;
    static HANDLE self;
    
    void init(){
        SYSTEM_INFO sysInfo;
        FILETIME ftime, fsys, fuser;
    
        GetSystemInfo(&sysInfo);
        numProcessors = sysInfo.dwNumberOfProcessors;
    
        GetSystemTimeAsFileTime(&ftime);
        memcpy(&lastCPU, &ftime, sizeof(FILETIME));
    
        self = GetCurrentProcess();
        GetProcessTimes(self, &ftime, &ftime, &fsys, &fuser);
        memcpy(&lastSysCPU, &fsys, sizeof(FILETIME));
        memcpy(&lastUserCPU, &fuser, sizeof(FILETIME));
    }
    
    double getCurrentValue(){
        FILETIME ftime, fsys, fuser;
        ULARGE_INTEGER now, sys, user;
        double percent;
    
        GetSystemTimeAsFileTime(&ftime);
        memcpy(&now, &ftime, sizeof(FILETIME));
    
        GetProcessTimes(self, &ftime, &ftime, &fsys, &fuser);
        memcpy(&sys, &fsys, sizeof(FILETIME));
        memcpy(&user, &fuser, sizeof(FILETIME));
        percent = (sys.QuadPart - lastSysCPU.QuadPart) +
            (user.QuadPart - lastUserCPU.QuadPart);
        percent /= (now.QuadPart - lastCPU.QuadPart);
        percent /= numProcessors;
        lastCPU = now;
        lastUserCPU = user;
        lastSysCPU = sys;
    
        return percent * 100;
    }
    

Linux

On Linux the choice that seemed obvious at first was to use the POSIX APIs like getrusage() etc. I spent some time trying to get this to work, but never got meaningful values. When I finally checked the kernel sources themselves, I found out that apparently these APIs are not yet completely implemented as of Linux kernel 2.6!?

In the end I got all values via a combination of reading the pseudo-filesystem /proc and kernel calls.

  • Total Virtual Memory:

    #include "sys/types.h"
    #include "sys/sysinfo.h"
    
    struct sysinfo memInfo;
    
    sysinfo (&memInfo);
    long long totalVirtualMem = memInfo.totalram;
    //Add other values in next statement to avoid int overflow on right hand side...
    totalVirtualMem += memInfo.totalswap;
    totalVirtualMem *= memInfo.mem_unit;
    
  • Virtual Memory currently used:

    Same code as in "Total Virtual Memory" and then

    long long virtualMemUsed = memInfo.totalram - memInfo.freeram;
    //Add other values in next statement to avoid int overflow on right hand side...
    virtualMemUsed += memInfo.totalswap - memInfo.freeswap;
    virtualMemUsed *= memInfo.mem_unit;
    
  • Virtual Memory currently used by current process:

    #include "stdlib.h"
    #include "stdio.h"
    #include "string.h"
    
    int parseLine(char* line){
        // This assumes that a digit will be found and the line ends in " Kb".
        int i = strlen(line);
        const char* p = line;
        while (*p <'0' || *p > '9') p++;
        line[i-3] = '\0';
        i = atoi(p);
        return i;
    }
    
    int getValue(){ //Note: this value is in KB!
        FILE* file = fopen("/proc/self/status", "r");
        int result = -1;
        char line[128];
    
        while (fgets(line, 128, file) != NULL){
            if (strncmp(line, "VmSize:", 7) == 0){
                result = parseLine(line);
                break;
            }
        }
        fclose(file);
        return result;
    }
    



  • Total Physical Memory (RAM):

    Same code as in "Total Virtual Memory" and then

    long long totalPhysMem = memInfo.totalram;
    //Multiply in next statement to avoid int overflow on right hand side...
    totalPhysMem *= memInfo.mem_unit;
    
  • Physical Memory currently used:

    Same code as in "Total Virtual Memory" and then

    long long physMemUsed = memInfo.totalram - memInfo.freeram;
    //Multiply in next statement to avoid int overflow on right hand side...
    physMemUsed *= memInfo.mem_unit;
    
  • Physical Memory currently used by current process:

    Change getValue() in "Virtual Memory currently used by current process" as follows:

    int getValue(){ //Note: this value is in KB!
        FILE* file = fopen("/proc/self/status", "r");
        int result = -1;
        char line[128];
    
        while (fgets(line, 128, file) != NULL){
            if (strncmp(line, "VmRSS:", 6) == 0){
                result = parseLine(line);
                break;
            }
        }
        fclose(file);
        return result;
    }
    



  • CPU currently used:

    #include "stdlib.h"
    #include "stdio.h"
    #include "string.h"
    
    static unsigned long long lastTotalUser, lastTotalUserLow, lastTotalSys, lastTotalIdle;
    
    void init(){
        FILE* file = fopen("/proc/stat", "r");
        fscanf(file, "cpu %llu %llu %llu %llu", &lastTotalUser, &lastTotalUserLow,
            &lastTotalSys, &lastTotalIdle);
        fclose(file);
    }
    
    double getCurrentValue(){
        double percent;
        FILE* file;
        unsigned long long totalUser, totalUserLow, totalSys, totalIdle, total;
    
        file = fopen("/proc/stat", "r");
        fscanf(file, "cpu %llu %llu %llu %llu", &totalUser, &totalUserLow,
            &totalSys, &totalIdle);
        fclose(file);
    
        if (totalUser < lastTotalUser || totalUserLow < lastTotalUserLow ||
            totalSys < lastTotalSys || totalIdle < lastTotalIdle){
            //Overflow detection. Just skip this value.
            percent = -1.0;
        }
        else{
            total = (totalUser - lastTotalUser) + (totalUserLow - lastTotalUserLow) +
                (totalSys - lastTotalSys);
            percent = total;
            total += (totalIdle - lastTotalIdle);
            percent /= total;
            percent *= 100;
        }
    
        lastTotalUser = totalUser;
        lastTotalUserLow = totalUserLow;
        lastTotalSys = totalSys;
        lastTotalIdle = totalIdle;
    
        return percent;
    }
    
  • CPU currently used by current process:

    #include "stdlib.h"
    #include "stdio.h"
    #include "string.h"
    #include "sys/times.h"
    #include "sys/vtimes.h"
    
    static clock_t lastCPU, lastSysCPU, lastUserCPU;
    static int numProcessors;
    
    void init(){
        FILE* file;
        struct tms timeSample;
        char line[128];
    
        lastCPU = times(&timeSample);
        lastSysCPU = timeSample.tms_stime;
        lastUserCPU = timeSample.tms_utime;
    
        file = fopen("/proc/cpuinfo", "r");
        numProcessors = 0;
        while(fgets(line, 128, file) != NULL){
            if (strncmp(line, "processor", 9) == 0) numProcessors++;
        }
        fclose(file);
    }
    
    double getCurrentValue(){
        struct tms timeSample;
        clock_t now;
        double percent;
    
        now = times(&timeSample);
        if (now <= lastCPU || timeSample.tms_stime < lastSysCPU ||
            timeSample.tms_utime < lastUserCPU){
            //Overflow detection. Just skip this value.
            percent = -1.0;
        }
        else{
            percent = (timeSample.tms_stime - lastSysCPU) +
                (timeSample.tms_utime - lastUserCPU);
            percent /= (now - lastCPU);
            percent /= numProcessors;
            percent *= 100;
        }
        lastCPU = now;
        lastSysCPU = timeSample.tms_stime;
        lastUserCPU = timeSample.tms_utime;
    
        return percent;
    }
    

TODO: Other Platforms

I would assume, that some of the Linux code also works for the Unixes, except for the parts that read the /proc pseudo-filesystem. Perhaps on Unix these parts can be replaced by getrusage() and similar functions? If someone with Unix know-how could edit this answer and fill in the details?!