On macOS there is a tool called fs_usage which can be used to see what files are accessed on the system while it is running. It needs sudo to run.

Watch files by process

1. Find out the PID of the process that should be monitored

ps aux | grep php-fpm

2. Listen for file system access

sudo fs_usage -f "pathname" [pid]

Explanation

• access checks whether the calling process can access the file pathname
• open creates a new open file description, an entry in the system-wide table of open files
• close closes a file descriptor
• stat64 returns information about a file

Sources

• http://manpagez.com/man/1/fs_usage/
• https://linux.die.net/man/2/access
• https://linux.die.net/man/2/open
• https://linux.die.net/man/2/stat64

#published