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Idea #15668: Disk I/O priority

Written by Eldmannen the 16 Nov 08 at 02:23. Category: System. Related project: Nothing/Others. Status: New
Rationale
If you are copying large amounts of data in Nautilus or something, or you're installing some software then the computer gets very slow to use while it is doing that. You just hear your disk chugging and the computer is slow and unresponsive.

I propose that set the disk I/O priority of file transfers (Nautilus), Synaptic and Update-Manager to one of less importance.

Copying files is an time unimportant process. It is done when its done. It shouldn't use up all disk bandwidth when you are trying to do something interactive with the computer.

If we change the disk I/O priority for certain processes, it will result in Ubuntu being much more responsive and useful under heavy load.
If you're not doing anything interactive while copying the files, the transfer would run at full-speed and still be just as fast as before.

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Solution #1: Auto-generated solution of idea #15668
Written by Eldmannen the 16 Nov 08 at 02:23.
Ubuntu Brainstorm was updated in January 2009. Since the idea #15668 was submitted before this update, its rationale and solution are not separated. Please vote accordingly, and if you have the necessary rights, please separate the rationale from the solution. Thanks!

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crazyivan wrote on the 16 Nov 08 at 19:38
+1

As has been said before, for the desktop user the *perceived* responsiveness is very important. I imagine average joe can stand waiting a bit longer for the transfer if, in the meantime, he can do other things.

On the other hand, some users will want to hammer the I/O bus at full tilt to get transfers done quickly. They wouldn't want the file transfer manager to have low disk I/O priority then. I'm thinking particularly of servers - assuming there are servers out there running Ubuntu server edition (and not just using Debian instead :P ), we don't want to slow them down.

So... I guess what you want is to set this as the default behaviour in Desktop edition, with the option available to go back to file transfer / apt etc. having high disk I/O priority. In Server edition, it's probably best to leave it as file transfer manager having high priority.

gmatht wrote on the 17 Nov 08 at 09:19
Well, nautilus could simply ionice all its own copy commands. This wouldn't affect servers at all.

Of course for copys within a single file system, you'll typically want a "Copy-on-write" copy which is instantaneous and doesn't require anymore disk space except for modified files: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copy-on-write

ScarySquirrel wrote on the 30 Nov 08 at 07:26
I concur wholeheartedly with the post by crazyivan here.
When I open Rythmbox or transfer files, my mouse sticks.
It does not need to stick.
Eldmannen++

crazyivan wrote on the 4 Dec 08 at 11:02
@gmatht

Lest we forget, not every user of Gnome is using Nautilus. PCManFM and Thunar are just two of the plethora of file managers out there.

Either every single one of them changes their behaviour (hopeless to coordinate) or we implement something that can change them all from underneath (actually possible).

sayakb (Brainstorm admin) wrote on the 4 Dec 08 at 18:32
Good idea! Esp useful for guys like me having an old laptop.


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