Interestingly, "read the kernel’s process table directly to make a list of running programs" is exactly how the "ps" command worked in the distant past. It's a

Interestingly, "read the kernel’s process table directly to make a list of running programs" is exactly how the "ps" command worked in the distant past. It's a bit hard to find information about this nowadays, but I could find a couple of SE answers (https://unix.stackexchange.com/a/340893 https://unix.stackexchange.com/a/340893 and https://unix.stackexchange.com/a/511530 https://unix.stackexchange.com/a/511530) which mention this fact.