kill command help

 kill - terminate a process
 

SYNOPSIS

 kill [ -s signal | -p ] [ -a ] pid ...
 kill -l [ signal ]
 

DESCRIPTION

 kill sends the specified signal to the specified process.
 If no signal is specified, the TERM signal is sent. The
 TERM signal will kill processes which do not catch this
 signal. For other processes, if may be necessary to use
 the KILL (9) signal, since this signal cannot be caught.
 
 Most modern shells have a builtin kill function.
 

OPTIONS

 pid ...
 Specify the list of processes that kill should sigュ
 nal. Each pid can be one of four things. A proュ
 cess name in which case processes called that will
 be signaled. n where n is larger than 0. The proュ
 cess with pid n will be signaled. -1 in which case
 all processes from MAX_INT to 2 will be signaled,
 as allowed by the issuing user. -n where n is
 larger than 1, in which case processes in process
 group n are signaled. IFF a negative argument is
 given the signal must be specified first, otherwise
 it will be taken as the signal to send.
 
 -s Specify the signal to send. The signal may be
 given as a signal name or number.
 
 -p Specify that kill should only print the process id
 (pid) of the named process, and should not send it
 a signal.
 
 -l Print a list of signal names. These are found in
 /usr/include/linux/signal.h
 

SEE ALSO

 bash(1) , tcsh(1) , kill(2) , sigvec(2) 
 

AUTHOR

 Taken from BSD 4.4. The ability to translate process
 names to process ids was added by Salvatore Valente <svaュ
 lente@mit.edu>.