From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Sep 11 19:11:40 2003 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 52A8716A4BF for ; Thu, 11 Sep 2003 19:11:40 -0700 (PDT) Received: from obsecurity.dyndns.org (adsl-64-169-107-253.dsl.lsan03.pacbell.net [64.169.107.253]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 7879E43FFB for ; Thu, 11 Sep 2003 19:11:39 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from kris@obsecurity.org) Received: from rot13.obsecurity.org (rot13.obsecurity.org [10.0.0.5]) by obsecurity.dyndns.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 204B466D32; Thu, 11 Sep 2003 19:11:39 -0700 (PDT) Received: by rot13.obsecurity.org (Postfix, from userid 1000) id 05FB7836; Thu, 11 Sep 2003 19:11:38 -0700 (PDT) Date: Thu, 11 Sep 2003 19:11:38 -0700 From: Kris Kennaway To: Joe Altman , freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Message-ID: <20030912021138.GA8792@rot13.obsecurity.org> References: <20030912000405.GA5982@panix.com> <20030912003951.GA2226@plewe.is.tsukuba.ac.jp> <20030912005001.GD8251@rot13.obsecurity.org> <20030912020538.GA22921@panix.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/signed; micalg=pgp-sha1; protocol="application/pgp-signature"; boundary="k1lZvvs/B4yU6o8G" Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20030912020538.GA22921@panix.com> User-Agent: Mutt/1.4.1i Subject: Re: On 5.1, what is the process named "idle"? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 12 Sep 2003 02:11:40 -0000 --k1lZvvs/B4yU6o8G Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On Thu, Sep 11, 2003 at 10:05:38PM -0400, Joe Altman wrote: > > The idle task is the kernel thread that runs when the kernel is not > > doing anything else more meaningful like running user processes or > > servicing I/O. It takes care of running some low-priority tasks like > > pre-zeroing memory pages in preparation for future demand. >=20 > So, should it be in a constant state of RUN, and consume more than 90% > of CPU and WCPU for more than twenty four hours? If your machine is more than 90% idle, yes. > I've taken another look at this, and just noticed that there are tasks > with NICE ranging from 52 to -187 in 'top -SU root'...I'm not freaked > out by this, but note that I read the man page which indicates that > possible values range from 20 to -20. Yes, read what the -S option to top does. Kris --k1lZvvs/B4yU6o8G Content-Type: application/pgp-signature Content-Disposition: inline -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.3 (FreeBSD) iD8DBQE/YStaWry0BWjoQKURAjzbAKDrwqzAcU6DdsHPDT/9FXlmBkn+kACcCXYM TkdhrQtlaYZ8+ZB388NBkIc= =CujG -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --k1lZvvs/B4yU6o8G--