If you want to know how long programs are running, from creation to termination, you can enable the start and exit probes, as shown in the following example. Save it in a file named progtime.d:

proc:::start
{
  self->start = timestamp;
}

proc:::exit
/self->start/
{
  @[execname] = quantize(timestamp - self->start);
  self->start = 0;
}

Running the example script on a build server for several seconds results in output similar to the following:

# dtrace -s ./progtime.d
dtrace: script ’./progtime.d’ matched 2 probes
^C
...
cc
          value  ------------- Distribution ------------- count
       33554432 |                                         0
       67108864 |@@@                                      3
      134217728 |@                                        1
      268435456 |                                         0
      536870912 |@@@@                                     4
     1073741824 |@@@@@@@@@@@@@@                           13
     2147483648 |@@@@@@@@@@@@                             11
     4294967296 |@@@                                      3
     8589934592 |                                         0

sh
          value  ------------- Distribution ------------- count
         262144 |                                         0
         524288 |@                                        5
        1048576 |@@@@@@@                                  29
        2097152 |                                         0
        4194304 |                                         0
        8388608 |@@@                                      12
       16777216 |@@                                       9
       33554432 |@@                                       9
       67108864 |@@                                       8
      134217728 |@                                        7
      268435456 |@@@@@                                    20
      536870912 |@@@@@@                                   26
     1073741824 |@@@                                      14
     2147483648 |@@                                       11
     4294967296 |                                         3
     8589934592 |                                         1
    17179869184 |                                         0
...