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Adobe LM Service

Adobe License Management Service

^Top

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.

Airport Base Station Agent

Airport Base Station Agent

^Top

Monitors base stations on the network and provides software updates.

airportd

Airport daemon

^Top

Configures wireless card parameters automatically. Also, automatically connects to preferred wireless networks after restart if the network is available.

aped

Application Enhancer daemon

^Top

Developed by Unsanity for their Application Enhancer (APE) framework, it has the ability to load APE modules or haxies when certain applications are launched.

Apple Events

Apple Events

^Top

Provides GUI Scripting for AppleScript.

AppleFileServer

Apple File Protocol server

^Top

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

^Top

Provides spelling services throughout the system.

ATSServer

Apple Type Solution Server

^Top

Apple font management.

autofsd

AutoFS daemon

^Top

Runs in the background and waits for network filesystem requests or configuration changes, and when such an event occurs, launches automount to update the mount points.

automount

AutoFS Mount

^Top

Automatically Mounts/Unmounts Network Filesystems based on information provided by AutoFS. (See above)

bash

Born Again Shell

^Top

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

^Top

Responsible for bluetooth communication.

cgpdftoraster

Core Graphics PDF To Raster

^Top

A CUPS (Common Unix Printing System) filter that rasterizes vector based graphics into pixels in order to be used by the printer.

check_afp

AFP Client Session Monitor

^Top

Monitors AFP (Apple Filing Protocol) connections.

configd

System Configuration daemon

^Top

Provides notifications to applications about system configuration changes.

coreaudiod

CoreAudio daemon

^Top

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

coreservicesd

Core Services Daemon

^Top

Security Server.

crashreporterd

Crash Detection and Panic Logging daemon

^Top

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

cron

Crontab daemon

^Top

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

^Top

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.

curl

Client-side URL Transfers

^Top

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

^Top

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

^Top

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

^Top

Provides distributed notifications services.

dynamic_pager

Dynamic pager external storage manager

^Top

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

^Top

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

^Top

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

fseventsd

Filesystem Events daemon

^Top

Provides a way for applications to monitor when the contents of a directory are modified. For example a backup program needs to know whether a file/folder has been changed since a given date.

ftpd

FTP (File Transfer Protocol) daemon

^Top

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

grep

Global Regular Expression Print

^Top

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

groff

Groff document formatting system

^Top

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

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

hdid

HDI Driver

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

hidd

Human Interface Device daemon

^Top

httpd

Apache HyperText Transfer protocol (HTTP) server daemon

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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 running only if you have ‘Personal Web Sharing’ selected in ‘System Preferences’.

iCalAlarmScheduler

iCal Alarm Scheduler

^Top

Alerts you about upcoming appointments.

Image Capture Extension

Image Capture Extension

^Top

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

iTunes Helper

iTunes Helper

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Launches iTunes automatically when an audio CD is entered or when an iPod has been connected.

init

Process control initialization

^Top

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

^Top

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 procedures specified in the ‘Energy Saver’ preferences panel.

ipconfigd

IP Configuration daemon

^Top

Retrieve configuration and sets IP network parameters automatically.

ipfwloggerd

IPIP Firewall Logger deamon

^Top

Logs connection attempts when a firewall is active.

kernel_task

Kernel Task

^Top

Handles system kernel tasks.

KernelEventAgent

Kernel Event Agent

^Top

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

kextd

Kernel Extension daemon

^Top

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

LaunchCFMApp

Launch CFM Application

^Top

Runs CFM (carbon) Applications.

launchd

Launch daemon

^Top

Manages and launches daemons. 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

^Top

Less allows binary files to be read backwards.

login

Login

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The login process logs in users into the computer.

loginwindow

Login Window

^Top

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

lookupd

Lookup daemon

^Top

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.

lsd

Little Snitch daemon

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Proprietary daemon by Objective Development’s Little Snitch application. Little Snitch informs you whenever a program attempts to establish an outgoing Internet connection. You can then choose to allow or deny this connection, or define a rule how to handle similar, future connection attempts.

lsregister

Launch Services Database Registration

^Top

Registers applications in the Launch Services database. The Launch Services database keeps track of all application and what kind of files they can open.

mach_init

Mach Initializer

^Top

Mach kernel bootstrap (starts the system).

man

Manual

^Top

Displays and formats online UNIX manual pages.

mcxcompositor

Managed Client X Daemon Compositor

^Top

Controls preference files for managed accounts.

mdimport

Metadata importer

^Top

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

mDNSResponder

Multicast DNS Responder daemon

^Top

Provides network service announcement service.

mds

Metadata server

^Top

Metadata indexing engine for Spotlight.

mdsync

Metadata synchronizer

^Top

Metadata synchronizing for Spotlight.

memberd

Membership resolution daemon

^Top

Used by the system to resolves group membership permission conflicts.

netinfod

NetInfo daemon

^Top

Domain information server.

nfsiod

NFS asynchronous I/O server

^Top

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

notifyd

Notification server

^Top

Mac OS X notification system.

ntpd

Network time protocol daemon

^Top

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.

ocspd

Tiger  Leopard

OCSP and CRL daemon

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Used by the security framework. Retreives and manages a list of revoked security certificates via the OCSP (Online Certificate Status Protocol).

pcscd

PC/SC Smartcard daemon

^Top

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

Piton daemon

^Top

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

pboard

Pasteboard Server

^Top

Provides pasteboard (caching) services.

pmTool

Process Monitor Tool

^Top

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

portmap

Port Mapper

^Top

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

pppd

PPP (Point-to-point) daemon

^Top

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.

PubSubAgent

Leopard

Publication Subscription Agent

^Top

The PubSub agent syncs the RSS read/unread status of bookmarked RSS feeds between computers that are syncing bookmarks via .Mac Sync.

PubSubAgent is part of the Mac OS Publication Subscription technology introduced in Leopard. In short, it provides support for developers to subscribe to web feeds in their applications. According to Apple documentation, PubSubAgent is a background app that handles downloading of feeds, notification of Publication Subscription clients, and various other tasks.

HINT:
There have been reports of PubSubAgent unexpectedly quitting when used behind a proxy.

qmasterd

Qmaster daemon

^Top

Provides automatic load distribution across processors for CPU intensive projects.

rasterto [printers specific]

Raster To [printers specific]

^Top

A CUPS (Common Unix Printing System) filter that handles converting CUPS raster data to a printer.

RetroRun & RetroRunSL

RetroRun

^Top

Proprietary process by EMC Insignia’s Retrospect backup software.

rpc.lockd

Remote Procedure Call (RPC) Locking daemon

^Top

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

^Top

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.

service

Service

^Top

A simple utility to check what services are provided by the system. Can be used to start and stop services, as well as to determine the status of services.

SFLSharedPrefsTo

SFL Shared Preferences Tool

^Top

A .Mac tool using the (S/MIME Freeware Library) API’s to facilitate applications sharing data with a .Mac account.

SFL is a freeware implementation of IETF S/MIME v3 RFC 2630 CMS and
RFC 2634 ESS security protocols.

sh

Shell

^Top

See bash

slpd

SLP (Service Location protocol) daemon

^Top

Announces network services.

spindump

Spin Dump

^Top

A tool used by various system components to create hang reports and notify the user of application hangs.

Hint:
Hang reports are stored at:
/Library/Logs/HangReporter/[application-name]/[hang-date].hang

sshd

OpenSSH (Secure Shell) daemon

^Top

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

socketfilterfw

Socket Filter Firewall

^Top

syslogd

System Log utility

^Top

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

SystemStarter

System Starter

^Top

A utility to start or stop system services which are located in the StartupItems folder.

SystemUIServer

System User Interface Server

^Top

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

tbl

Table

^Top

Formats tables for the UNIX troff formatting system.

troff

Troff

^Top

Troff is a UNIX text processing program.

TWAINBridge

TWAIN Bridge

^Top

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

^Top

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.

usbmuxd

USB Muxing daemon

^Top

Performs USB multiplexing when synchronizing iTunes music libraries with USB music devices like iPods & iPhones.

WindowServer

Window Server

^Top

Manages Application Windows.

xinetd

Extended Internet Service daemon

^Top

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.

More processes coming up soon…
- diskmanagementto
- issave
- securityagent
- dashboardclient
- writeconfig
- schelper
- managedclient
- authorizationhos
- readconfig
- synchronize-pref

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