Lab
Cloud

Troubleshooting CPU Utilization

The ability to diagnose and resolve issues on a Linux system is a skill that every administrator needs to cultivate. In this lab, we cover using various reporting and monitoring utilities to troubleshoot issues with CPU utilization on the system.

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Path Info

Level

Intermediate

Duration

30m

Last updated

Aug 29, 2025

Challenge

Install the Monitoring and Reporting Utilities (`sysstat`)
Install the sysstat package using the following commands:
```
sudo -i
yum install -y sysstat
```

Challenge

Use the Monitoring and Reporting Utilities to Diagnose the Issue

This is a list of possible steps to take to find the source of the issue. Not all of them are required.

free -h
df -h
vmstat 1 4
iostat -y 1 3
iostat -cy 1 3
top <-- locate PID(s) that are taking up a large amount of CPU (gzip and cat)

Use the PIDs to discover the parent process ID (PPID) that spawned them and copy the offending script to /home/cloud_user/.

ps -ef | egrep "PID|PID" <-- You can grep for each individual PID (egrep saves a step) 
pstree -p (PID of kaladin.sh) <-- shows process tree in a visual format
cp /root/kaladin.sh /home/cloud_user/

Challenge

Terminate the Offending Process
Once the PID of the offending process has been located (kaladin.sh), use the kill command to terminate it.
```
kill -15 PID
```

Author

Pluralsight Skills

Pluralsight Skills gives leaders confidence they have the skills needed to execute technology strategy. Technology teams can benchmark expertise across roles, speed up release cycles and build reliable, secure products. By leveraging our expert content, skill assessments and one-of-a-kind analytics, keep up with the pace of change, put the right people on the right projects and boost productivity. It's the most effective path to developing tech skills at scale.

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