-5 Nice Processes

[Chafnan]

When I open top and look at the running processes, there a bunch that are -5 in the nice and 0 with everything else.

Any idea how to fix this?


1 root 20 0 4020 884 600 S 0.0 0.0 0:02.14 /sbin/init
2 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 kthreadd
3 root RT -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.02 migration/0
4 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.05 ksoftirqd/0
5 root RT -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 watchdog/0
6 root RT -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.02 migration/1
7 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 ksoftirqd/1
8 root RT -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 watchdog/1
9 root RT -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.01 migration/2
10 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.01 ksoftirqd/2
11 root RT -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 watchdog/2
12 root RT -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.01 migration/3
13 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.01 ksoftirqd/3
14 root RT -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 watchdog/3
15 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.19 events/0
16 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.01 events/1
17 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.09 events/2
18 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.01 events/3
19 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.03 khelper
51 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.09 kblockd/0
52 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.04 kblockd/1
53 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.05 kblockd/2
54 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.02 kblockd/3
57 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 kacpid
58 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 kacpi_notify
129 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 kseriod
185 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 ubstatd
187 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 pdflush
189 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 kswapd0
258 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 aio/0
259 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 aio/1
260 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 aio/2
261 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 aio/3
1233 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 ksnapd
1592 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 ksuspend_usbd
1594 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 khubd
1735 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 ata/0
1739 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 ata/1
1741 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 ata/2
1743 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 ata/3
1745 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 ata_aux
1790 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 scsi_eh_0
1793 root 15 -5 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 scsi_eh_1

[richardjh]

This is how it is supposed to be.

If you want to make changes to the niceness of running processes you can use renice.
For example

renice -n 5 -p 2 3 4 5

Would change the priority to 5 for processes 2 3 4 and 5.

A nice value of -5 means it is less nice than 0 and will take priority over these processes.

See man renice for more information, and be aware that you may cause problems to the running of the server.

[Chafnan]

Does that mean that it is normal for all of those processes to be running at -5 or is something wrong with the system?

[Xipher]

It's normal, those are actually kernel processes which should have a higher priority then normal processes.

[richardjh]

Yes, this is how it is supposed to be.

You may break your setup if you raise the nice value of these processes.