OpenBSD-4.6/usr.bin/nice/nice.1

.\"	$OpenBSD: nice.1,v 1.18 2009/02/08 17:15:10 jmc Exp $
.\"	$NetBSD: nice.1,v 1.6 1995/08/31 23:30:57 jtc Exp $
.\"
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.\"	@(#)nice.1	8.1 (Berkeley) 6/6/93
.\"
.Dd $Mdocdate: February 8 2009 $
.Dt NICE 1
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm nice
.Nd execute a utility with an altered scheduling priority
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.Nm nice
.Op Fl n Ar increment
.Ar utility
.Op Ar argument ...
.Sh DESCRIPTION
.Nm
runs
.Ar utility
at an altered scheduling priority.
If an
.Ar increment
is given, it is used; otherwise
an increment of 10 is assumed.
The superuser can run utilities with priorities higher than normal by using
a negative
.Ar increment .
The priority can be adjusted over a
range of \-20 (the highest) to 20 (the lowest).
.Pp
The options are as follows:
.Bl -tag -width Ds
.It Fl n Ar increment
A positive or negative decimal integer used to modify the system scheduling
priority of
.Ar utility .
.El
.Pp
The
.Nm
utility shall exit with one of the following values:
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width indent -offset indent -compact
.It 1\-125
An error occurred.
.It 126
The
.Ar utility
was found but could not be invoked.
.It 127
The
.Ar utility
could not be found.
.El
.Pp
Otherwise, the exit status of
.Nm
shall be that of
.Ar utility .
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr csh 1 ,
.Xr getpriority 2 ,
.Xr renice 8
.Sh STANDARDS
The
.Nm
utility is compliant with the
.St -p1003.1-2008
specification.
.Pp
The historic
.Fl Ns Ar increment
option has been deprecated but is still supported in this implementation.
.Pp
.Nm
also exists as a built-in to
.Xr csh 1 ,
though with a different syntax.
.Sh HISTORY
A
.Nm
utility appeared in
.At v6 .