[CLUE-Tech] top and system load

[David Anselmi]

Ed Hill wrote:

[...]


> Upgrade?  Almost certainly not.
>
> See whats causing the load and try to alleviate and/or understand it?
> Sure.
>
> I just fired up nine xterms and ran "yes" in every one.  So I now have a
> load average (as reported by top) of:
>
>   load average: 9.37, 8.08, 4.39

I agree with Ed.  "The load averages are the average number of process ready to
run during the last 1, 5 and 15 minutes."

The load averages tell you how many processes want to run each time they get a
chance.  Many may not because they are waiting for something like I/O to finish.
I don't really know how to interpret the load average, but I'd guess that a high
load average *and* high cpu use is bad.  One or the other might not be.

man top anyone?

Dave