NAME
sched_setscheduler, sched_getscheduler - set and get scheduling
policy/parameters
SYNOPSIS
#include <sched.h>
int sched_setscheduler(pid_t pid, int policy,
const struct sched_param *param);
int sched_getscheduler(pid_t pid);
struct sched_param {
...
int sched_priority;
...
};
DESCRIPTION
sched_setscheduler() sets both the scheduling policy and the associated
parameters for the process whose ID is specified in pid. If pid equals
zero, the scheduling policy and parameters of the calling process will
be set. The interpretation of the argument param depends on the
selected policy. Currently, Linux supports the following "normal"
(i.e., non-real-time) scheduling policies:
SCHED_OTHER the standard round-robin time-sharing policy;
SCHED_BATCH for "batch" style execution of processes; and
SCHED_IDLE for running very low priority background jobs.
The following "real-time" policies are also supported, for special
time-critical applications that need precise control over the way in
which runnable processes are selected for execution:
SCHED_FIFO a first-in, first-out policy; and
SCHED_RR a round-robin policy.
The semantics of each of these policies are detailed below.
sched_getscheduler() queries the scheduling policy currently applied to
the process identified by pid. If pid equals zero, the policy of the
calling process will be retrieved.
Scheduling Policies
The scheduler is the kernel component that decides which runnable
process will be executed by the CPU next. Each process has an
associated scheduling policy and a static scheduling priority,
sched_priority; these are the settings that are modified by
sched_setscheduler(). The scheduler makes it decisions based on
knowledge of the scheduling policy and static priority of all processes
on the system.
For processes scheduled under one of the normal scheduling policies
(SCHED_OTHER, SCHED_IDLE, SCHED_BATCH), sched_priority is not used in
scheduling decisions (it must be specified as 0).
Processes scheduled under one of the real-time policies (SCHED_FIFO,
SCHED_RR) have a sched_priority value in the range 1 (low) to 99
(high). (As the numbers imply, real-time processes always have higher
priority than normal processes.) Note well: POSIX.1-2001 only requires
an implementation to support a minimum 32 distinct priority levels for
the real-time policies, and some systems supply just this minimum.
Portable programs should use sched_get_priority_min(2) and
sched_get_priority_max(2) to find the range of priorities supported for
a particular policy.
Conceptually, the scheduler maintains a list of runnable processes for
each possible sched_priority value. In order to determine which
process runs next, the scheduler looks for the nonempty list with the
highest static priority and selects the process at the head of this
list.
A process’s scheduling policy determines where it will be inserted into
the list of processes with equal static priority and how it will move
inside this list.
All scheduling is preemptive: if a process with a higher static
priority becomes ready to run, the currently running process will be
preempted and returned to the wait list for its static priority level.
The scheduling policy only determines the ordering within the list of
runnable processes with equal static priority.
SCHED_FIFO: First In-First Out scheduling
SCHED_FIFO can only be used with static priorities higher than 0, which
means that when a SCHED_FIFO processes becomes runnable, it will always
immediately preempt any currently running SCHED_OTHER, SCHED_BATCH, or
SCHED_IDLE process. SCHED_FIFO is a simple scheduling algorithm
without time slicing. For processes scheduled under the SCHED_FIFO
policy, the following rules apply:
* A SCHED_FIFO process that has been preempted by another process of
higher priority will stay at the head of the list for its priority
and will resume execution as soon as all processes of higher
priority are blocked again.
* When a SCHED_FIFO process becomes runnable, it will be inserted at
the end of the list for its priority.
* A call to sched_setscheduler() or sched_setparam(2) will put the
SCHED_FIFO (or SCHED_RR) process identified by pid at the start of
the list if it was runnable. As a consequence, it may preempt the
currently running process if it has the same priority.
(POSIX.1-2001 specifies that the process should go to the end of the
list.)
* A process calling sched_yield(2) will be put at the end of the list.
No other events will move a process scheduled under the SCHED_FIFO
policy in the wait list of runnable processes with equal static
priority.
A SCHED_FIFO process runs until either it is blocked by an I/O request,
it is preempted by a higher priority process, or it calls
sched_yield(2).
SCHED_RR: Round Robin scheduling
SCHED_RR is a simple enhancement of SCHED_FIFO. Everything described
above for SCHED_FIFO also applies to SCHED_RR, except that each process
is only allowed to run for a maximum time quantum. If a SCHED_RR
process has been running for a time period equal to or longer than the
time quantum, it will be put at the end of the list for its priority.
A SCHED_RR process that has been preempted by a higher priority process
and subsequently resumes execution as a running process will complete
the unexpired portion of its round robin time quantum. The length of
the time quantum can be retrieved using sched_rr_get_interval(2).
SCHED_OTHER: Default Linux time-sharing scheduling
SCHED_OTHER can only be used at static priority 0. SCHED_OTHER is the
standard Linux time-sharing scheduler that is intended for all
processes that do not require the special real-time mechanisms. The
process to run is chosen from the static priority 0 list based on a
dynamic priority that is determined only inside this list. The dynamic
priority is based on the nice value (set by nice(2) or setpriority(2))
and increased for each time quantum the process is ready to run, but
denied to run by the scheduler. This ensures fair progress among all
SCHED_OTHER processes.
SCHED_BATCH: Scheduling batch processes
(Since Linux 2.6.16.) SCHED_BATCH can only be used at static priority
0. This policy is similar to SCHED_OTHER in that it schedules the
process according to its dynamic priority (based on the nice value).
The difference is that this policy will cause the scheduler to always
assume that the process is CPU-intensive. Consequently, the scheduler
will apply a small scheduling penalty with respect to wakeup behaviour,
so that this process is mildly disfavored in scheduling decisions.
This policy is useful for workloads that are noninteractive, but do not
want to lower their nice value, and for workloads that want a
deterministic scheduling policy without interactivity causing extra
preemptions (between the workload’s tasks).
SCHED_IDLE: Scheduling very low priority jobs
(Since Linux 2.6.23.) SCHED_IDLE can only be used at static priority
0; the process nice value has no influence for this policy.
This policy is intended for running jobs at extremely low priority
(lower even than a +19 nice value with the SCHED_OTHER or SCHED_BATCH
policies).
Privileges and resource limits
In Linux kernels before 2.6.12, only privileged (CAP_SYS_NICE)
processes can set a nonzero static priority (i.e., set a real-time
scheduling policy). The only change that an unprivileged process can
make is to set the SCHED_OTHER policy, and this can only be done if the
effective user ID of the caller of sched_setscheduler() matches the
real or effective user ID of the target process (i.e., the process
specified by pid) whose policy is being changed.
Since Linux 2.6.12, the RLIMIT_RTPRIO resource limit defines a ceiling
on an unprivileged process’s static priority for the SCHED_RR and
SCHED_FIFO policies. The rules for changing scheduling policy and
priority are as follows:
* If an unprivileged process has a nonzero RLIMIT_RTPRIO soft limit,
then it can change its scheduling policy and priority, subject to the
restriction that the priority cannot be set to a value higher than
the maximum of its current priority and its RLIMIT_RTPRIO soft limit.
* If the RLIMIT_RTPRIO soft limit is 0, then the only permitted changes
are to lower the priority, or to switch to a non-real-time policy.
* Subject to the same rules, another unprivileged process can also make
these changes, as long as the effective user ID of the process making
the change matches the real or effective user ID of the target
process.
* Special rules apply for the SCHED_IDLE: an unprivileged process
operating under this policy cannot change its policy, regardless of
the value of its RLIMIT_RTPRIO resource limit.
Privileged (CAP_SYS_NICE) processes ignore the RLIMIT_RTPRIO limit; as
with older kernels, they can make arbitrary changes to scheduling
policy and priority. See getrlimit(2) for further information on
RLIMIT_RTPRIO.
Response time
A blocked high priority process waiting for the I/O has a certain
response time before it is scheduled again. The device driver writer
can greatly reduce this response time by using a "slow interrupt"
interrupt handler.
Miscellaneous
Child processes inherit the scheduling policy and parameters across a
fork(2). The scheduling policy and parameters are preserved across
execve(2).
Memory locking is usually needed for real-time processes to avoid
paging delays; this can be done with mlock(2) or mlockall(2).
Since a nonblocking infinite loop in a process scheduled under
SCHED_FIFO or SCHED_RR will block all processes with lower priority
forever, a software developer should always keep available on the
console a shell scheduled under a higher static priority than the
tested application. This will allow an emergency kill of tested real-
time applications that do not block or terminate as expected. See also
the description of the RLIMIT_RTTIME resource limit in getrlimit(2).
POSIX systems on which sched_setscheduler() and sched_getscheduler()
are available define _POSIX_PRIORITY_SCHEDULING in <unistd.h>.
RETURN VALUE
On success, sched_setscheduler() returns zero. On success,
sched_getscheduler() returns the policy for the process (a nonnegative
integer). On error, -1 is returned, and errno is set appropriately.
ERRORS
EINVAL The scheduling policy is not one of the recognized policies, or
param does not make sense for the policy.
EPERM The calling process does not have appropriate privileges.
ESRCH The process whose ID is pid could not be found.
CONFORMING TO
POSIX.1-2001 (but see BUGS below). The SCHED_BATCH and SCHED_IDLE
policies are Linux-specific.
NOTES
POSIX.1 does not detail the permissions that an unprivileged process
requires in order to call sched_setscheduler(), and details vary across
systems. For example, the Solaris 7 manual page says that the real or
effective user ID of the calling process must match the real user ID or
the save set-user-ID of the target process.
Originally, Standard Linux was intended as a general-purpose operating
system being able to handle background processes, interactive
applications, and less demanding real-time applications (applications
that need to usually meet timing deadlines). Although the Linux kernel
2.6 allowed for kernel preemption and the newly introduced O(1)
scheduler ensures that the time needed to schedule is fixed and
deterministic irrespective of the number of active tasks, true real-
time computing was not possible up to kernel version 2.6.17.
Real-time features in the mainline Linux kernel
From kernel version 2.6.18 onwards, however, Linux is gradually
becoming equipped with real-time capabilities, most of which are
derived from the former realtime-preempt patches developed by Ingo
Molnar, Thomas Gleixner, Steven Rostedt, and others. Until the patches
have been completely merged into the mainline kernel (this is expected
to be around kernel version 2.6.30), they must be installed to achieve
the best real-time performance. These patches are named:
patch-kernelversion-rtpatchversion
and can be downloaded from
http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/projects/rt/.
Without the patches and prior to their full inclusion into the mainline
kernel, the kernel configuration offers only the three preemption
classes CONFIG_PREEMPT_NONE, CONFIG_PREEMPT_VOLUNTARY, and
CONFIG_PREEMPT_DESKTOP which respectively provide no, some, and
considerable reduction of the worst-case scheduling latency.
With the patches applied or after their full inclusion into the
mainline kernel, the additional configuration item CONFIG_PREEMPT_RT
becomes available. If this is selected, Linux is transformed into a
regular real-time operating system. The FIFO and RR scheduling
policies that can be selected using sched_setscheduler() are then used
to run a process with true real-time priority and a minimum worst-case
scheduling latency.
BUGS
POSIX says that on success, sched_setscheduler() should return the
previous scheduling policy. Linux sched_setscheduler() does not
conform to this requirement, since it always returns 0 on success.
SEE ALSO
getpriority(2), mlock(2), mlockall(2), munlock(2), munlockall(2),
nice(2), sched_get_priority_max(2), sched_get_priority_min(2),
sched_getaffinity(2), sched_getparam(2), sched_rr_get_interval(2),
sched_setaffinity(2), sched_setparam(2), sched_yield(2),
setpriority(2), capabilities(7), cpuset(7)
Programming for the real world - POSIX.4 by Bill O. Gallmeister,
O’Reilly & Associates, Inc., ISBN 1-56592-074-0
The kernel source file Documentation/scheduler/sched-rt-group.txt
(since kernel 2.6.25).
COLOPHON
This page is part of release 3.24 of the Linux man-pages project. A
description of the project, and information about reporting bugs, can
be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.