What is Ditto?

There is a ditto command in UNIX, that copies files. It might be used by any number of Apple or 3rd-party apps, that need to copy a file or files.

If you see it again, see what user it's running for, and select it and click the Inspect icon in the toolbar. That will show the +Parent Process,+ which might tell you something about where it's coming from. It might even show a clue in the +Open Files and Ports+ tab.

Copying one or more big files might indeed make your Mac run hot. 🙂

open Terminal and type "man ditto", that'll give you an explanation what it is (or google it)
it's part of every unix/linux/macos installation

Is ditto maybe what Time Machine uses under-the-hood for copying files to the backup? Now I'm curious...

Thomas A Reed wrote:
Is ditto maybe what Time Machine uses under-the-hood for copying files to the backup? Now I'm curious...

No, I don't think so. I've never seen it running during a backup, anyway.

Had you been trying to unzip something before this happened?

I found two earlier threads suggesting that that a runaway ditto process can be caused by an unzip utility that encounters a damaged zip file:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=10161062
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=9233662#9233662

Peter Brooks5 wrote:
No, but I did have another problem. Earlier, I had been trying to send some info on Apple's Bug Reporter website and the transmission hung up. I ended up closing Safari. Other than that, nothing unusual.

That might well have been it, copying some system configuration, attributes, logs, etc.

Unless it happens again, it's probably just one of those odd things, not worth worrying about.