| CPU nice time is a measure of the time the CPU(s) spend
running processes in usermode and the process's priority has
been lowered below its base priority. (see hardclock() in
kern_clock.c).
When you're not looking at cpd files:
- vmstat combines user and nice time under its 'us' display.
- iostat splits out user and nice time in its display.
I figure a significant amount of nice time indicates that the
system is giving low priority processes plenty of time to run
(which is good ... depending on for what the system is used).
Its not good if normal and high priority processes are
blocked on some resource, which would then allow low priority
processes to run.
-< Ken
|