How To Use Sample Process For Mac

In this article, I will tell you what is macOS sample process and how to use the macOS sample process to analyze the macOS process issue.

1. What Is macOS Sample Process?

1. Sample Process is a built-in utility on macOS that allows you to monitor and troubleshoot processes running on your computer.
2. It captures a snapshot of the process’s activity and generates a report that can be used to diagnose issues or identify resource usage.
3. When you use Sample Process, it captures a series of stack traces, which are snapshots of the process’s call stack at a given point in time.
4. These stack traces can be used to identify the functions or methods that the process is currently executing, and can help pinpoint performance issues or resource usage.
5. The Sample Process utility is available in the Activity Monitor application on macOS.
6. You can use it to sample any process currently running on your computer, including system processes and third-party applications.

2. How To Use Sample Process In macOS?

1. The Sample Process is a built-in utility on Mac that allows you to monitor and troubleshoot processes running on your computer. Here are the steps to use Sample Process.
2. Open the Activity Monitor by searching for it in Spotlight or navigating to Applications > Utilities > Activity Monitor.
3. Select the process you want to sample by clicking on it in the list of processes.
4. Click on the Gear icon on the macOS activity monitor top left corner.
5. Then click the “Sample Process” menu item from the drop-down list.
6. A new window will appear displaying a sample of the process’s activity. You can use this information to diagnose issues or identify resource usage.
7. To save the sample, click on the “Save” button in the toolbar and choose a location to save the file.
8. There is also a Display drop-down list in the sample process dialog window top left corner.
9. There are several items in the display drop-down list, such as Sample Text, Number of Samples, Number of Seconds, Percent of Parent, and Percent of Thread.
10. Below is an example of the sample process content.

    Sampling process 801 for 3 seconds with 1 millisecond of run time between samples
    Sampling completed, processing symbols...
    Analysis of sampling Android File Transfer Agent (pid 801) every 1 millisecond
    Process:         Android File Transfer Agent [801]
    Path:            /Users/USER/Library/Application Support/Google/*/Android File Transfer Agent.app/Contents/MacOS/Android File Transfer Agent
    Load Address:    0x100238000
    Identifier:      com.google.android.mtpagent
    Version:         1.0.507.1136
    Code Type:       X86-64
    Parent Process:  ??? [1]
    
    Date/Time:       2023-04-02 10:52:43.655 +0800
    Launch Time:     2023-04-02 08:49:59.061 +0800
    OS Version:      Mac OS X 10.15.7 (19H524)
    Report Version:  7
    Analysis Tool:   /usr/bin/sample
    
    Physical footprint:         1784K
    Physical footprint (peak):  1856K
    ----
    
    Call graph:
        2732 Thread_8064   DispatchQueue_1: com.apple.main-thread  (serial)
        + 2732 start  (in Android File Transfer Agent) + 52  [0x1002395d4]
        +   2732 main  (in Android File Transfer Agent) + 1426  [0x10023a1ba]
        +     2732 -[NSRunLoop(NSRunLoop) run]  (in Foundation) + 76  [0x7fff34addc7f]
        +       2732 -[NSRunLoop(NSRunLoop) runMode:beforeDate:]  (in Foundation) + 212  [0x7fff34a2b1d8]
        +         2732 CFRunLoopRunSpecific  (in CoreFoundation) + 466  [0x7fff3236d953]
        +           2732 __CFRunLoopRun  (in CoreFoundation) + 1329  [0x7fff3236e4e1]
        +             2732 __CFRunLoopServiceMachPort  (in CoreFoundation) + 247  [0x7fff3236fa27]
        +               2732 mach_msg  (in libsystem_kernel.dylib) + 60  [0x7fff6b9ff170]
        +                 2732 mach_msg_trap  (in libsystem_kernel.dylib) + 10  [0x7fff6b9fedfa]
        2732 Thread_8478
          2732 start_wqthread  (in libsystem_pthread.dylib) + 15  [0x7fff6bac1b77]
            2732 _pthread_wqthread  (in libsystem_pthread.dylib) + 390  [0x7fff6bac2aa1]
              2732 __workq_kernreturn  (in libsystem_kernel.dylib) + 10  [0x7fff6ba004ce]
    
    Total number in stack (recursive counted multiple, when >=5):
    
    Sort by top of stack, same collapsed (when >= 5):
            __workq_kernreturn  (in libsystem_kernel.dylib)        2732
            mach_msg_trap  (in libsystem_kernel.dylib)        2732
    
    Binary Images:
           0x100238000 -        0x100241ff7 +com.google.android.mtpagent (1.0.507.1136) <40B4DF54-D212-3FC9-8261-BD44FD765A6D> /Users/*/Library/Application Support/Google/*/Android File Transfer Agent.app/Contents/MacOS/Android File Tra