Mac OSX Common processes

Depending on your system and applications, some of the listed processes may or may not show up. Some of the listed processes have been discontinued as of Mac OSX 10.4 or earlier.
Last updated 1/7/2007

For a full technical listing check Apple's Developer Connection

ATSServer

Apple Type Solution Server

Apple font management

Adobe LM Service

Adobe License Management Service

This is Adobe's license management service, It's used to make sure you have a valid serial number and are not using a pirated copy of their software. This process can be killed, but it will relaunch when you use one of their products.

Apple Events

Apple Events

Provides GUI Scripting for AppleScript.

AppleFileServer

Apple File Protocol server

Shares your personal files, only present if you have enabled 'Personal File Sharing'. To enable/disable; Launch System Preferences. Select Sharing. Select the Services tab. Select Personal File Sharing and check/uncheck the box.

AppleSpell

Apple Spell

Provides spelling services throughout the system.

automount

Automatic Mount/Unmount

Automatically Mounts/Unmounts Network Filesystems.

bash

Born Again Shell

GNU's bash is a Command Line Interface (CLI) shell / interface. The application Terminal in Utilities is an example of a CLI shell that uses bash.

blued

Bluetooth daemon

Responsible for bluetooth communication.

check_afp

AFP Client Session Monitor

Monitors AFP (Apple Filing Protocol) connections.

configd

System Configuration daemon

Provides notifications to applications about system configuration changes.

coreaudiod

CoreAudio daemon

Introduced with OSX version 10.4. Used for CoreAudio Related Purposes.

coreservicesd

Core Services Daemon

Security Server.

crashreporterd

Crash Detection and Panic Logging daemon

Responsible for crash detection. Listens for exceptions and launches Crash Reporter to investigate and report the crash to the user.

cron

Crontab daemon

Responsible to execute scheduled commands. Looks through the crontab files and follows scheduled instructions. Cron wakes up every minute, to examine all stored crontab files, checking if something needs to be run in the current minute.

cupsd

Common Unix Printing System daemon

Implements an additional printing system based on the Internet Printing (IP) Protocol.

curl

Client-side URL Transfers

Used to transfer data from and to a server. Supports the following protocols: HTTP, FTP, GOPHER, DICT, TELNET, LDAP & FILE. Designed to operate autonomously.

DirectoyService

DirectoryService daemon

Part of the Open Directory technology, DirectoryService gathers directory access information which includes permissions for directories and mounted disks and provides it to whatever program requested it.

diskarbitrationd

Disk Arbitration daemon

Notifies the system about the appearance and disappearance of disks and filesystems, also manages the mounting of disks & filesystems and arbitrates claiming of disks.

distnoted

Distributed Notifications daemon

Provides distributed notifications services.

dynamic_pager

Dynamic pager external storage manager

Manages a pool of swap files which is used by the system to support demand paging (virtual memory). Dynamic pager adds swap files as system load increases, and deletes files when the resources are no longer needed.

Executor

Executor

Proprietary process by Prosoft Data Backup. You will only have this in your system if you have installed Prosoft's Data Backup program. Very difficult to get rid of, keeps showing up every time you use Data Backup; even if there isn't anything scheduled.

fsck_hfs

HFS File System Consistency Check

The fsck_hfs utility verifies and repairs standard HFS and HFS+ file systems.

ftpd

FTP (File Transfer Protocol) daemon

FTP is an internet protocol for transfering files. ftpd listens to the specified port (usually 21) for connection requests, and processes authentication and file transfers.

grep

Global Regular Expression Print

Searches an input file for lines containing a match to the given regular expression (regexp) pattern.

groff

Groff document formatting system

Groff (GNU troff) software is a Command Line Interface (CLI) typesetting package which reads plain text mixed with formatting commands and produces formatted output.

grotty

Groff Teletypewriter driver

Grotty translates the output of GNU troff into a form suitable for typewriter-like devices.

hdid

HDI Driver

Responsible for disk image loading and for compressed disk image decompression.

httpd

Apache HyperText Transfer protocol (HTTP) server daemon

The Apache HTTP Server is an open-source HTTP server which serves pages from your computer to the public. The default server folder is located in /Library/WebServer/Documents. Usually runing only if you have 'Personal Web Sharing' slected in 'System Preferences'.

iCalAlarmScheduler

iCal Alarm Scheduler

Alerts you about upcoming appointments.

Image Capture Extension

Image Capture Extension

Works with the Image Capture application, receives events from external peripherals used by Image Capture.

iTunes Helper

iTunes Helper

init

Process control initialization

Part of the boot process. Reads the initialization information file (ttys) and executes the commands. Usually executes the login utility.

ioupsd

Input/output UPS daemon

If you have an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) connected to your computer (usually through USB), this process will monitor the UPS status. In the event of a power failure, ioupsd will follow the precedures specified in the 'Energy Saver' preferences panel.

ipconfigd

IP Configuration daemon

Retrieve configuration and sets IP network parameters automatically.

ipfwloggerd

IP Firewall Logger deamon

Logs connection attempts when a firewall is active.

kernel_task

Kernel Task

Handles system kernel tasks.

KernelEventAgent

Kernel Event Agent

Disk & server events notifications. Notifies users about file and disk problems.

kextd

Kernel Extension daemon

A daemon process that handles requests for on demand loading & unloading system extensions.

LaunchCFMApp

Launch CFM Application

Runs CFM (carbon) Applications

launchd

Launch daemon

Manages and launches deamons. launchd is the first process called by the system during startup, once running launchd looks through certain system folders for daemons to launch.

less

Less

Less alowes binary files to be read backwards.

login

Login

The login process logs in users into the computer.

loginwindow

Login

A program that displays the Login window after the system starts up, and allowes you to enter a username and password.

lookupd

Lookup daemon

The lookup daemon is a process that finds information like usernames, computer names, printers and IP addresses and provides the results to programs that requested them.

mDNSResponder

Multicast DNS Responder daemon

Provides network service announcement service.

mach_init

Mach Initializer

Mach kernel bootstrap (starts the system).

man

Manual

Displays and formats online UNIX manual pages.

mdimport

Metadata importer

Imports file hierarchies to spotlight metadata server (the Spotlight indexing engine).

mds

Metadata server

Metadata indexing engine for Spotlight.

mdsync

Metadata synchronizer

Metadata synchronizing for Spotlight.

memberd

Membership resolution daemon

Used by the system to resolves group membership permission conflicts.

netinfod

NetInfo daemon

Domain information server.

nfsiod

NFS asynchronous I/O server

Enables NFS (Network File System) asynchronous Input/Output data transfer (concurrent data streams), and improves disk performance.

notifyd

Notification server

Mac OS X notification system.

ntpd

Network time protocol daemon

An operating system daemon which automatically synchronizes and maintains the system time through internet standard time servers. ntpd usually checks for the correct time every 1000 seconds, if the configuration file is missing; ntpd will poll the time server every 64 seconds, until it can determine how accurate the built-in time keeping chip is and reduce the checking frequency to a level where the timescale is effectively continuous.

pcscd

PC/SC Smartcard daemon

A daemon that coordinates communications with smartcard readers. PC/SC Smartcard daemon will load the correct driver for different types of card readers allowing applications to communicate with smartcards without knowing specific technical details of the card reader chipset.

pbs

Pasteboard server

Cocoa frameworks helper & pasteboard server.

pitond

Piton daemon

Proprietary multicast daemon. Used by EMC Insignia's Retrospect backup software to find local backup client.

pmTool

Process Monitor Tool

Invoked by the Activity Monitor. Polls the system and collects detailed process information, which is usually displayed in 'Activity Monitor'.

portmap

Port Mapper

Converts RPC program numbers to DARPA protocol numbers. RPC (Remote Precedure Call) is a protocol that allows a program to execute code on another computer.

pppd

PPP (Point-to-point) daemon

A protocol used for establishing internet connections over dialup, DSL and other types of links. Some of the PPP daemon responsibilities include, IP negotiation, authentication and security.

qmasterd

Qmaster daemon

Provides automatic load distribution across processors for CPU intensive projects.

RetroRun & RetroRunSL

RetroRun

Proprietary process by EMC Insignia's Retrospect backup software

rpc.lockd

Remote Procedure Call (RPC) Locking daemon

Locks files or records on a network. Monitors files & records on a network, if a user opens a file rpc.lockd locks the file for other users.

securityd

Security daemon

Maintains security & cryptographic operations and control access to keychain items. securityd was first introduced in Mac OS X version 10.0 (Cheetah) as the "Security Server" and was renamed in 10.4 (Panther) to securityd.

sh

Shell

See bash.

slpd

SLP (Service Location protocol) daemon

Announces network services.

sshd

OpenSSH (Secure Shell) daemon

Listens for incoming ssh (secure shell) connections and provides encrypted communications over an insecure network.

syslogd

System Log utility

Processes & controls the flow of log messages from client processes.

SystemUIServer

System User Interface Server

Maintains the Menu Items on the right side of the menubar, like Date & Time, Language & other custom menus.

tbl

Table

Formats tables for the UNIX troff formatting system.

troff

Troff

Troff is a UNIX text processing program.

TWAINBridge

TWAIN Bridge

TWAIN is a standard for acquiring images from image scanners. TWAINBridge is a driver which connects TWAIN compatible devices to applications. TWAIN is maintained by The TWAIN Working Group.

update

Update

Flushes (writes) filesystem caches to the disk. Update helps protect the integrity of disk volumes by flushing volatile cached filesystem data to disk at thirty second intervals.

WindowServer

Window Server

Manages Application Windows.

xinetd

Extended Internet Service daemon

Starts programs that provide Internet services. Instead of having services like FTP, HTTP and telnet started at system boot time, and stay dormant until a connection request comes in, only xinetd is started and listens on all ports for services listed in the configuration file. When a request arrives, xinetd starts the appropriate service.

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