I set up a hbase/hadoop cluster on ec2 using Apache Whirr but when I ssh into the namenode (hbase master) and run $JAVA_HOME/bin/jps all I see running is jps, no mention of hbase or namenode. They are running, however, because I was able to work with both of them. Any explanation for this?
jps displays java processes for the current user, and sometimes only sessions it can resolve to the current user (so doesn't always work as expected).
Try a ps axww | grep java instead, that should list the java executables running, with full command line arguments