True, though "ps" isn't the best example, as it's one of the least portable commands I've ever seen. :) Its output is not even consistent from one Unix variant

True, though "ps" isn't the best example, as it's one of the least portable commands I've ever seen. :) Its output is not even consistent from one Unix variant to another. I kind of hope most Unix variants follow the /proc filesystem model of Linux. It basically cleans up these kinds of queries considerably.