Getting the parameters of a running JVM

Question

Is there a way to get the parameters of a running JVM? Is there a command line tool like jstat which takes as input the pid of the JVM and returns its starting parameters? I

Answer 1

You can use jps like

jps -lvm

prints something like

4050 com.intellij.idea.Main -Xms128m -Xmx512m -XX:MaxPermSize=250m -ea -Xbootclasspath/a:../lib/boot.jar -Djb.restart.code=88
4667 sun.tools.jps.Jps -lvm -Dapplication.home=/opt/java/jdk1.6.0_22 -Xms8m

Answer 2

Alternatively, you can use jinfo

jinfo -flags <vmid> 
jinfo -sysprops <vmid>

Answer 3

I am adding this new answer because as per JDK8 documentation jcmd is suggested approach now.

It is suggested to use the latest utility, jcmd instead of the previous jstack, jinfo, and jmap utilities for enhanced diagnostics and reduced performance overhead.

Below are commands to get your properties/flags you want.

jcmd pid VM.system_properties
jcmd pid VM.flags

We need pid, for this use jcmd -l, like below

username@users-Air:~/javacode$ jcmd -l 
11441 Test 
6294 Test 
29197 jdk.jcmd/sun.tools.jcmd.JCmd -l 

Now time to use these pids to get properties/flags you want

Command: jcmd 11441 VM.system_properties

11441:
#Tue Oct 17 12:44:50 IST 2017
gopherProxySet=false
awt.toolkit=sun.lwawt.macosx.LWCToolkit
file.encoding.pkg=sun.io
java.specification.version=9
sun.cpu.isalist=
sun.jnu.encoding=UTF-8
java.class.path=.
java.vm.vendor=Oracle Corporation
sun.arch.data.model=64
java.vendor.url=http\://java.oracle.com/
user.timezone=Asia/Kolkata
java.vm.specification.version=9
os.name=Mac OS X
sun.java.launcher=SUN_STANDARD
user.country=US
sun.boot.library.path=/Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/jdk-9.jdk/Contents/Home/lib
sun.java.command=Test
http.nonProxyHosts=local|*.local|169.254/16|*.169.254/16
jdk.debug=release
sun.cpu.endian=little
user.home=/Users/XXXX
user.language=en
java.specification.vendor=Oracle Corporation
java.home=/Library/Java/JavaVirtualMachines/jdk-9.jdk/Contents/Home
file.separator=/
java.vm.compressedOopsMode=Zero based
line.separator=\n
java.specification.name=Java Platform API Specification
java.vm.specification.vendor=Oracle Corporation
java.awt.graphicsenv=sun.awt.CGraphicsEnvironment
sun.management.compiler=HotSpot 64-Bit Tiered Compilers
ftp.nonProxyHosts=local|*.local|169.254/16|*.169.254/16
java.runtime.version=9+181
user.name=XXXX
path.separator=\:
os.version=10.12.6
java.runtime.name=Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment
file.encoding=UTF-8
java.vm.name=Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM
java.vendor.url.bug=http\://bugreport.java.com/bugreport/
java.io.tmpdir=/var/folders/dm/gd6lc90d0hg220lzw_m7krr00000gn/T/
java.version=9
user.dir=/Users/XXXX/javacode
os.arch=x86_64
java.vm.specification.name=Java Virtual Machine Specification
java.awt.printerjob=sun.lwawt.macosx.CPrinterJob
sun.os.patch.level=unknown
MyParam=2
java.library.path=/Users/XXXX/Library/Java/Extensions\:/Library/Java/Extensions\:/Network/Library/Java/Extensions\:/System/Library/Java/Extensions\:/usr/lib/java\:.
java.vm.info=mixed mode
java.vendor=Oracle Corporation
java.vm.version=9+181
sun.io.unicode.encoding=UnicodeBig
java.class.version=53.0
socksNonProxyHosts=local|*.local|169.254/16|*.169.254/16

Command : jcmd 11441 VM.flags output:

11441:
-XX:CICompilerCount=3 -XX:ConcGCThreads=1 -XX:G1ConcRefinementThreads=4 -XX:G1HeapRegionSize=1048576 -XX:InitialHeapSize=67108864 -XX:MarkStackSize=4194304 -XX:MaxHeapSize=1073741824 -XX:MaxNewSize=643825664 -XX:MinHeapDeltaBytes=1048576 -XX:NonNMethodCodeHeapSize=5830092 -XX:NonProfiledCodeHeapSize=122914074 -XX:ProfiledCodeHeapSize=122914074 -XX:ReservedCodeCacheSize=251658240 -XX:+SegmentedCodeCache -XX:-UseAOT -XX:+UseCompressedClassPointers -XX:+UseCompressedOops -XX:+UseFastUnorderedTimeStamps -XX:+UseG1GC 

For more instructions of usages of jcmd, see my blog post

Answer 4

Windows 10 or Windows Server 2016 provide such information in their standard task manager. A rare case for production, but if the target JVM is running on Windows, the simplest way to see its parameters is to press Ctrl+Alt+Delete, choose the Processes tab and add the Command line column (by clicking the right mouse button on any existing column header).

Answer 5

On linux, you can run this command and see the result :

ps aux | grep "java"

Answer 6

_JAVA_OPTIONS is an env variable that can be expanded.

echo $_JAVA_OPTIONS