"ps -o" Not valid: XPG4 Only. What does that mean?

UNIX HP-UX
1

When I tried to specify columns with ps

ps -o"pid,stime"

I get the following error:

ps: illegal option -- o

The man page says that -o is XPG4 only. All the other options that also say "XPG4 only" don't work either. What is XPG4? is it a compiler option of some sort that must not be checked? or is there also going to be a XPG4 version of each program on the HP Unix box?

Thanks,
Gold Fish

2

it's a different version of ps in /usr/xpg4/bin

3

When I do

$ cd /usr/xpg4/
bash: cd: /usr/xpg4/: No such file or directory

I don't have root access to the machine so I can't fix this... was this due to bad configuration on the admin's part? or this just an unusual configuration option to not compile the xpg4 versions?

Is there anyway for me to get the source for the xpg4 versions to compile in my home direcotry? I haven't found anything in my google searches. In fact, almost every other version of ps I've used allows "-o", so if I could just find SOME version that I can compile in my home directory.

Gold Fish

4

hmmm - been a long time...try setting the ENV variable

UNIX95=

(that's UNIX95=<space>)

e.g.:

UNIX95= ps -o comm,sz,vsz,time,user,uid
5

Whoo, nice! That worked!
I've done a bit of googling on UNIX95 to try and understand it. The solution seen most often is
alias ps="UNIX95= /usr/bin/ps"

Another solution I tried was using a perminate variable:
$export UNIX95=
$ps -o comm
which worked... Is this a better solution? or is this going to have unforseen(potentially bad) effects on the other HP Unix core utilities?

Thanks,
Gold Fish