Skip to content

Enhancement: show more detail than just process name in the VRAM tooltip #1

Description

@noosxe

Problem

The hover tooltip lists the processes consuming VRAM, but currently it shows only the bare process name. That is often not enough to identify what is actually running.

For example, a bar entry may just say python. There can be many python processes, and the name alone does not tell you:

  • which one is the model-training job vs. a throwaway script,
  • what arguments it was launched with,
  • which working directory or container it belongs to,
  • the full command line.

The same applies to other generic interpreters/runtimes (e.g. node, java, python3) that get reused for many unrelated things.

Current behavior

Tooltip shows per-process rows with the process name only (nvtop-style label).

Desired behavior

Give the user enough context to disambiguate processes that share the same name. Possible options (to be decided in design):

  • Show the full command line / args (cmdline) instead of, or in addition to, the bare process name.
  • Show a shortened/truncated command line to keep the tooltip compact (e.g. first N chars + …).
  • Show PID + process name so the user can cross-reference with ps/htop.
  • Show a derived/parenthetical hint, e.g. python (train.py) or python (/opt/llama-server).

Notes / considerations

  • Data source is nvidia-smi pmon, which gives the PID; the richer process info (cmdline, cwd) would have to be read from /proc/<pid> on Linux, which is outside the current collector scope. This needs a design decision in docs/DESIGN.md.
  • Whatever we show must stay readable in the tooltip (width limits, truncation).
  • NVIDIA-only, same as the rest of the plugin.

/label enhancement

Activity

Sign up for free to join this conversation on GitHub. Already have an account? Sign in to comment

Metadata

Metadata

Assignees

No one assigned

    Labels

    enhancementNew feature or request

    Projects

    No projects

      Milestone

      No milestone

      Relationships

      None yet

      Development

      No branches or pull requests

      Issue actions