Interactive TUI for exploring and cleaning up processes - find orphans, memory hogs, and kill them.

Features

• Memory overview - Real-time total/used/free/swap display
• Multiple views - All, Orphaned, Killable, Process Groups, High Memory
• Orphan detection - Finds processes whose parent died (PPID=1)
• Killable detection - Orphans safe to kill (not tmux, not system services)
• Stale detection - Flags processes with deleted executables
• Tmux awareness - Won't flag tmux processes as orphan candidates
• Batch operations - Select multiple processes and kill them at once
• Process grouping - Find duplicate/similar processes consuming resources
• Custom columns - Select which columns to display in CLI output
• Configurable thresholds - Adjust memory filters via CLI flags
• Preview mode - Dry-run for kill operations with formatting options
• CLI mode - Scriptable commands with JSON/CSV/Markdown output
• Clickable TUI - Click headers to sort, rows to select

Installation

pip install procclean

Or with uv (recommended):

uv tool install procclean

Or with pipx:

pipx install procclean

Run without installing:

uvx procclean
# or
pipx run procclean

Usage

TUI Mode (default)

procclean

CLI Commands

# List processes
procclean list                      # List processes (table)
procclean ls                        # Alias for 'list'
procclean list -f json|csv|md       # Different output formats
procclean list -s mem|cpu|pid|name|cwd  # Sort by field
procclean list -a                   # Sort ascending (default: descending)
procclean list -o                   # Orphans only
procclean list -m                   # High memory only (>500MB)
procclean list -k                   # Killable orphans only
procclean list --cwd                # Filter by current directory
procclean list --cwd /path/to/dir   # Filter by specific cwd
procclean list -n 20                # Limit output to 20 processes
procclean list -c pid,name,rss_mb   # Custom columns
procclean list --min-memory 10      # Only processes using >10 MB
procclean list --high-memory-threshold 1000  # High-mem at 1000 MB

# Process groups
procclean groups                    # Show process groups
procclean g                         # Alias for 'groups'
procclean groups -f json            # Groups as JSON

# Kill processes
procclean kill <PID> [PID...]       # Kill process(es)
procclean kill -f <PID>             # Force kill (SIGKILL)
procclean kill --cwd /path -y       # Kill all in cwd (skip confirm)
procclean kill -k -y                # Kill all killable orphans
procclean kill -k --preview         # Preview what would be killed
procclean kill -k --dry-run         # Alias for --preview
procclean kill -k --preview -O json # Preview in JSON format

# Memory summary
procclean mem                       # Show memory summary
procclean memory                    # Full name for 'mem'
procclean mem -f json               # Memory info as JSON

TUI Keybindings

Key	Action
q	Quit
r	Refresh
k	Kill selected (SIGTERM)
K	Force kill (SIGKILL)
o	Show orphans
O	Show killable
a	Show all
g	Show groups
w	Filter by selected cwd
W	Clear cwd filter
Space	Toggle selection
s	Select all visible
c	Clear selection
1	Sort by memory
2	Sort by CPU
3	Sort by PID
4	Sort by name
5	Sort by cwd
!	Reverse sort order

Click column headers to sort, click rows to toggle selection.

Views

• All Processes - All user processes sorted by memory usage
• Orphaned - Processes with PPID=1 (parent died)
• Killable - Orphans safe to kill (not in tmux, not system services)
• Process Groups - Similar processes grouped together
• High Memory - Processes using >500MB RAM (configurable)

Output Formats

CLI supports multiple output formats via -f:

• table - Human-readable table (default)
• json - JSON array for scripting
• csv - CSV for spreadsheets
• md - Markdown table

Custom Columns

Use -c to specify which columns to display:

procclean list -c pid,name,rss_mb,cwd

Available columns: pid, name, rss_mb, cpu_percent, cwd, ppid, parent_name, status, cmdline, username

Requirements

• Python 3.14+
• Linux (uses /proc filesystem)

Development

git clone https://github.com/kjanat/procclean
cd procclean
uv sync
uv run pre-commit install --install-hooks

Run tests:

uv run pytest                    # All tests
uv run pytest --cov -vv          # With coverage

Lint and type check:

uv run ruff check src/
uv run ty check

License

MIT