4 posts tagged with "processes"

Netdata reads /proc/<pid>/stat for all processes, once per second and extracts utime and stime (user and system cpu utilization), much like all the console tools do.

But it also extracts cutime and cstime that account the user and system time of the exit children of each process. By keeping a map in memory of the whole process tree, it is capable of assigning the right time to every process, taking into account all its exited children.

It is tricky, since a process may be running for 1 hour and once it exits, its parent should not receive the whole 1 hour of cpu time in just 1 second - you have to subtract the cpu time that has been reported for it prior to this iteration.

It is even trickier, because walking through the entire process tree takes some time itself. So, if you sum the CPU utilization of all processes, you might have more CPU time than the reported total cpu time of the system. Netdata solves this, by adapting the per process cpu utilization to the total of the system.

Context switching is the process of switching the CPU from one process, task or thread to another. In a multitasking operating system, such as Linux, the CPU has to switch between multiple processes or threads in order to keep the system running smoothly. This is necessary because each CPU core without hyperthreading can only execute one process or thread at a time. If there are many processes or threads running simultaneously, and very few CPU cores available to handle them, the system is forced to make more context switches to balance the CPU resources among them.

Context switching is an essential function of any multitasking operating system, but it also comes at a cost. The whole process is computationally intensive, and the more context switches that occur, the slower the system becomes. This is because each context switch involves saving the current state of the CPU, loading the state of the new process or thread, and then resuming execution of the new process or thread. This takes time and consumes CPU resources, which can slow down the system.

The impact of context switching on system performance can be significant, especially in systems with many processes or threads running simultaneously.

The different states of system processes are essential to understanding how a computer system works. Each state represents a specific point in a process's life cycle and can impact system performance and stability.

Netdata is committed to making it simpler and easier for everyone to monitor and troubleshoot their infrastructure. With that goal in mind, we're excited to announce the launch of our new "Functions" feature, which allows Netdata Agent collectors to expose "functions" that can be executed in run-time and on-demand.