Comment by xaerise

This is busybox, not the general linux distros.

busybox in Alpine Linux has for example `ps` builtin. If you install ps with `apk add ps` to get the full version, it will remove the symlink for /bin/ps and replace it with the one you installed.

You need to read up on the purpose of busybox. It is not something that the kernel people has decided upon. It is an initiative of an group of people who needed some tools onto a single floppy.

/bin/ps on a Debian distro is 154522 bytes. The whole busybox in Alpine Linux is 804616 bytes and contains a whole lot more than just ps.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BusyBox https://busybox.net/