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Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2007 14:03:37 -0400
From: Bill Moran <wmoran@potentialtech.com>
To: Laszlo Nagy <gandalf@designaproduct.biz>
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Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Subject: Re: interpreting uptime output
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In response to Laszlo Nagy <gandalf@designaproduct.biz>:

>  From the manual:
> > NAME
> >      uptime -- show how long system has been running
> >
> > SYNOPSIS
> >      uptime
> >
> > DESCRIPTION
> >      The uptime utility displays the current time, the length of time 
> > the sys-
> >      tem has been up, the number of users, and the load average of the 
> > system
> >      over the last 1, 5, and 15 minutes.
> This is great, except that it does not tell me what "0.5" means? Example:
> 
>  1:41PM  up 5 days,  2:22, 4 users, load averages: 0.36, 0.42, 0.51
> 
> The only referenced material in the man page is w(1) which tells this:
> 
>  > The load average numbers give the number of jobs in the run queue 
> averaged over 1, 5 and 15 minutes.
> 
> What are those "jobs"? I guess they are not processes. What is that "run 
> queue"? Which is better, the lower or the higher number?

Higher is a busier system.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load_average

-- 
Bill Moran
http://www.potentialtech.com