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Idea #1871: Smarten process priority

bug This idea is a duplicate of Idea #3201: IO-intensive operations cause machine to freeze or become jerky.
Written by Bram the 29 Feb 08 at 21:59. Category: System. Related project: Nothing/Others. Status: New
Rationale
One of the weaker points in Linux in general is, to my opinion, the balance in process priority. I'm using a fast and up-to-date dual core system.

But for example it's nearly impossible to compile an updated XBMC SVN version and watch a Youtube video at the same time. The compiling takes up almost all available resources. The same happens when I'm uploading files to my local server using FTP while I'm listening music with Amarok. The music stops for a short time every once in a while because the uploading is taking up all resources. These are simple examples....

The finger can be pointed at the applications I use (Konsole, FileZilla, Firefox and Amarok in this example). But in my opinion priority management should not be the responsibility of an application. It's out of it's scope.

Just my two cents...
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Solution #1: Auto-generated solution of idea #1871
Written by Bram the 29 Feb 08 at 21:59.
Ubuntu Brainstorm was updated in January 2009. Since the idea #1871 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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carlinuxlearner wrote on the 29 Feb 08 at 22:35
This sounds like a hardware problem, not an Ubuntu problem.
I also have a up-to-date Dual core system, (AMD Athlon X2 64 4800 (2.5Ghz), 2GB Dual channel DDR-2 800) and I can render a short video (100 frames) in Blender3D WHILE listening to music and writing this, and it's running fine! (and I'm rendering with multi-threads)

carlinuxlearner wrote on the 29 Feb 08 at 22:38
I'm also watching a youtube video.

Bram wrote on the 29 Feb 08 at 22:41
It's not a hardware problem, I'm experencing this on all 4 machines I run Kubuntu on, all with completely different hardware and no other speed problems whatsoever.
It might have something to do with the apllications I'm using, but as I said. Load balancing is not something developers of these kind of applications should have to worry about. To my humble opinion, that is.

Felix_the_Mac wrote on the 29 Feb 08 at 23:41

I don't know if the system can always correctly guess what priority you would like you programs to have.

Maybe if the 'Task Manager' could let you adjust priorities easily and remember them ??

(BTW, have you tried the Ubuntu real time kernel, it is in Synaptic?)

jeanpaul145 wrote on the 1 Mar 08 at 00:04
In Hardy this should at least partly be fixed, seeing as how the CFS schedule (I believe) gives some priority to GUI apps to promote the responsiveness "feeling" that the user has.

alexandreracine wrote on the 1 Mar 08 at 17:26
You can also change the priority of processes in command line with "nice" (man nice) or in the system monitor, right clic on the process and change the priority.

jsnow wrote on the 4 Mar 08 at 22:59
It might be a problem with the Adobe flash plugin, if that's what you're using to watch youtube videos. I seem to recall one time when flash videos were really jerky for no apparent reason, and then I changed the CPU frequency scaling to stick to one frequency, and it resolved the issue. (I assume flash was using the time stamp counter to figure out the current time, but that isn't reliable if the cpu speed is variable.) That doesn't explain Amarok, though, so it may well be a scheduling problem.

zoubidoo wrote on the 4 Mar 08 at 23:40
This problem is called priority inversion and is a difficulty with scheduling. The linux kernel has had this problem for years and despite work on improving the scheduling I keep noticing it.

I also reported the problem here:
http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/3201/


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