The following discussion enumerates the sources of process information, the privileges required to see process information, and describes the content of process list entries.
Process information is available from these sources:
-
The
SHOW PROCESSLIST
statement: Section 15.7.7.31, “SHOW PROCESSLIST Statement” -
The mysqladmin processlist command: Section 6.5.2, “mysqladmin — A MySQL Server Administration Program”
-
The
INFORMATION_SCHEMA
PROCESSLIST
table: Section 28.3.23, “The INFORMATION_SCHEMA PROCESSLIST Table” -
The Performance Schema
processlist
table: Section 29.12.22.7, “The processlist Table” -
The Performance Schema
threads
table columns with names having a prefix ofPROCESSLIST_
: Section 29.12.22.8, “The threads Table” -
The
sys
schemaprocesslist
andsession
views: Section 30.4.3.22, “The processlist and x$processlist Views”, and Section 30.4.3.33, “The session and x$session Views”
The threads
table compares to SHOW PROCESSLIST
, INFORMATION_SCHEMA
PROCESSLIST
, and mysqladmin processlist as follows:
-
Access to the
threads
table does not require a mutex and has minimal impact on server performance. The other sources have negative performance consequences because they require a mutex.NoteAn alternative implementation for
SHOW PROCESSLIST
is available based on the Performance Schemaprocesslist
table, which, like thethreads
table, does not require a mutex and has better performance characteristics. For details, see Section 29.12.22.7, “The processlist Table”. -
The
threads
table displays background threads, which the other sources do not. It also provides additional information for each thread that the other sources do not, such as whether the thread is a foreground or background thread, and the location within the server associated with the thread. This means that thethreads
table can be used to monitor thread activity the other sources cannot. -
You can enable or disable Performance Schema thread monitoring, as described in Section 29.12.22.8, “The threads Table”.
For these reasons, DBAs who perform server monitoring using one of the other thread information sources may wish to monitor using the threads
table instead.
The sys
schema processlist
view presents information from the Performance Schema threads
table in a more accessible format. The sys
schema session
view presents information about user sessions like the sys
schema processlist
view, but with background processes filtered out.
For most sources of process information, if you have the PROCESS
privilege, you can see all threads, even those belonging to other users. Otherwise (without the PROCESS
privilege), nonanonymous users have access to information about their own threads but not threads for other users, and anonymous users have no access to thread information.
The Performance Schema threads
table also provides thread information, but table access uses a different privilege model. See Section 29.12.22.8, “The threads Table”.
Each process list entry contains several pieces of information. The following list describes them using the labels from SHOW PROCESSLIST
output. Other process information sources use similar labels.
-
Id
is the connection identifier for the client associated with the thread. -
User
andHost
indicate the account associated with the thread. -
db
is the default database for the thread, orNULL
if none has been selected. -
Command
andState
indicate what the thread is doing.Most states correspond to very quick operations. If a thread stays in a given state for many seconds, there might be a problem that needs to be investigated.
The following sections list the possible
Command
values, andState
values grouped by category. The meaning for some of these values is self-evident. For others, additional description is provided.NoteApplications that examine process list information should be aware that the commands and states are subject to change.
-
Time
indicates how long the thread has been in its current state. The thread's notion of the current time may be altered in some cases: The thread can change the time withSET TIMESTAMP =
. For a replica SQL thread, the value is the number of seconds between the timestamp of the last replicated event and the real time of the replica host. See Section 19.2.3, “Replication Threads”.value
-
Info
indicates the statement the thread is executing, orNULL
if it is executing no statement. ForSHOW PROCESSLIST
, this value contains only the first 100 characters of the statement. To see complete statements, useSHOW FULL PROCESSLIST
(or query a different process information source).