processes
in [Linux Help]
|
Prev: anti-virus
Next: New distro's site
From: Dave Krebes on 17 Feb 2010 16:45 Is the term "process" used in more than one sense in the IT world? My understanding of "process" is that the CPU of a personal computer cycles through a set of tasks called "processes". There are typically 50-100 of these. One process may monitor input from the keyboard, another to convert data to a certain protocol, another to update the clock, etc. The CPU performs a single calculation for a specific process and then moves on to the next process. The instructions for this calculation are fed to the CPU from the RAM (or cache?) The speed of the CPU, in Hertz, is the number of such visits (calculations) the CPU performs in one second. So if there are 100 processes and the speed of the CPU is 1 GHz, then the CPU will perform a calculation for a given process 10M times per second. The CPU needs to "flush itself out" after each calculation (due to some sort of lingering electromagnetic field?) and this, not the speed of electricity, is the limiting factor in the speed of a CPU, and in turn the main factor in the speed of the computer. Is this right? And what is in the "proc" directory?
From: Ivan Marsh on 17 Feb 2010 16:59 Dave Krebes wrote: > Is the term "process" used in more than one sense in the IT world? > > My understanding of "process" is that the CPU of a personal computer > cycles > through a set of tasks called "processes". There are typically 50-100 of > these. One process may monitor input from the keyboard, another to > convert > data to a certain protocol, another to update the clock, etc. The CPU > performs a single calculation for a specific process and then moves on to > the next process. The instructions for this calculation are fed to the > CPU > from the RAM (or cache?) The speed of the CPU, in Hertz, is the number of > such visits (calculations) the CPU performs in one second. So if there > are 100 processes and the speed of the CPU is 1 GHz, then the CPU will > perform a > calculation for a given process 10M times per second. The CPU needs to > "flush itself out" after each calculation (due to some sort of lingering > electromagnetic field?) and this, not the speed of electricity, is the > limiting factor in the speed of a CPU, and in turn the main factor in the > speed of the computer. > > Is this right? And what is in the "proc" directory? What platform are you referring to CISC, RISC... Do your own homework. -- "All right, all right, if it will make you happy, I will overthrow society." - Philip J. Fry
From: Whiskers on 17 Feb 2010 18:11 On 2010-02-17, Dave Krebes <dkrebes(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Is the term "process" used in more than one sense in the IT world? > > My understanding of "process" is that the CPU of a personal computer cycles > through a set of tasks called "processes". There are typically 50-100 of > these. [...] > Is this right? Not exactly. My laptop seems to be running many thousand processes right now; two of them are the editor I'm typing into right now and the terminal emulator that editor is running in ... PIDs 15450 and 15398 respectively. > And what is in the "proc" directory? Why not take a look? -- -- ^^^^^^^^^^ -- Whiskers -- ~~~~~~~~~~
From: John Hasler on 17 Feb 2010 19:58 Whiskers writes: > My laptop seems to be running many thousand processes right now... Not likely. > ...two of them are the editor I'm typing into right now and the > terminal emulator that editor is running in ... PIDs 15450 and 15398 > respectively. Every time a new process is started it gets the next higher PID. PIDs are not reused until the counter wraps around. Try "ps a | wc -l". -- John Hasler jhasler(a)newsguy.com Dancing Horse Hill Elmwood, WI USA
From: SM on 18 Feb 2010 03:35
2010-02-18, Steve Ackman skribis: > In <3sZen.66141$Db2.22198(a)edtnps83>, on Wed, 17 Feb 2010 21:45:35 GMT, > Dave Krebes, dkrebes(a)gmail.com wrote: >> And what is in the "proc" directory? > > Different on every system. To see what's in yours... > > $ cd /proc > $ ls -l > Unnecessary use of cd ;) -- kasmra :wq |