SniporaFix “address already in use” in one click
EADDRINUSE usually means a server you forgot about. The fix is always the same three steps, so the app does them.
In short
When a command Portlivo started can’t bind its port, a notification says who holds it, for example “Port 5173 is already in use by node (acme-web)”, with Kill Holder & Retry. One click stops the holder, waits for the port to come free and starts your command again.
Port 5173 is already in use
“npm run dev” in acme-web couldn’t start — an old Vite (PID 41877) holds it.
When you get the button
The notification comes for commands Portlivo starts: a stack, a Restart, or Start Again on a watched port. A command you typed in your own terminal prints its error there, where Portlivo can’t see it. The holder is still one search away: type the port number in the panel and stop it from its row.
From Terminal, devports kill 5173 does the same. See the CLI.
Why it never stops the wrong thing
- The list can be a scan old, and macOS reuses PIDs. Before stopping anything, it checks the PID still has the start time and command line it listed. If not, nothing is stopped.
- It sends SIGTERM, the plain quit signal, so the server can clean up. There’s no force-kill.
- A Docker port belongs to Docker’s proxy, so it stops the container (
docker stop) instead of Docker itself. - A Homebrew service gets
brew services stop, so it doesn’t respawn; other launchd jobs are booted out. php artisan serveleaves aphp -Sworker holding the port on older Laravel versions; that’s stopped too.
The same thing by hand
lsof -nP -iTCP:5173 -sTCP:LISTEN
kill <PID>The full walk-through, with the Docker and Homebrew cases, is in Port already in use on a Mac.
Questions people ask
- What if the process ignores SIGTERM?
- It keeps running and stays in the list. Portlivo doesn’t escalate; if you’re sure, run
kill -9 <PID>in Terminal. - Can it stop system processes?
- They’re hidden unless you turn on Show System Processes, and Stop Visible never touches them. macOS also won’t let an app stop another user’s processes.
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