Documentation/proc.txt update

From: Jorge Nerin (comandante@zaralinux.com)
Date: Sun Nov 12 2000 - 18:32:59 EST


Hello, this is a patch with some updates to the Documetation/proc.txt
file, basically it contains updates to the new files in /proc/<PID>, new
files in /proc, and a paragraph about /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_ecn. It's
far from complete, but it's a start point.

--- old/proc.txt Mon Oct 23 15:20:00 2000
+++ new/proc.txt Mon Nov 13 00:20:24 2000
@@ -46,7 +46,7 @@
 the SuSE Linux distribution. As there is no complete documentation
for the
 /proc file system and we've used many freely available sources to
write these
 chapters, it seems only fair to give the work back to the Linux
community.
-This work is based on the 2.2.* kernel version. I'm afraid it's still
far from
+This work is based on the 2.2.* kernel version and the upcomming 2.4.*.
I'm afraid it's still far from
 complete, but we hope it will be useful. As far as we know, it is
the first
 'all-in-one' document about the /proc file system. It is focused on
the Intel
 x86 hardware, so if you are looking for PPC, ARM, SPARC, APX, etc.,
features,
@@ -92,7 +92,7 @@
 
 The proc file system acts as an interface to internal data structures
in the
 kernel. It can be used to obtain information about the system and to
change
-certain kernel parameters at runtime.
+certain kernel parameters at runtime (sysctl).
 
 First, we'll take a look at the read-only parts of /proc. In
Chapter 2, we
 show you how you can use /proc/sys to change settings.
@@ -111,16 +111,17 @@

..............................................................................
  File Content
  cmdline Command line arguments
- environ Values of environment variables
+ cpu Current and last cpu in wich it was executed (2.4)(smp)
+ cwd Link to the Current Working Directory
+ environ Values of environment variables
+ exe Link to the executable in the filesystem
  fd Directory, which contains all file descriptors
+ maps Maps to executables and library files (2.4)
  mem Memory held by this process
+ root Link to the root directory of this process
  stat Process status
- status Process status in human readable form
- cwd Link to the current working directory
- exe Link to the executable of this process
- maps Memory maps
- root Link to the root directory of this process
  statm Process memory status information
+ status Process status in human readable form

..............................................................................
 
 For example, to get the status information of a process, all you have
to do is
@@ -131,6 +132,7 @@
   State: R (running)
   Pid: 5452
   PPid: 743
+ TracerPid: 0 (2.4)
   Uid: 501 501 501 501
   Gid: 100 100 100 100
   Groups: 100 14 16
@@ -187,13 +189,20 @@
  devices Available devices (block and character)
  dma Used DMS channels
  filesystems Supported filesystems
+ driver Various drivers grouped here, currently rtc (2.4)
+ execdomains Execdomains, related to security (2.4)
+ fb Frame Buffer devices (2.4)
+ fs File system parameters, currently nfs/exports (2.4)
  ide Directory containing info about the IDE subsystem
  interrupts Interrupt usage
+ iomem Memory map (2.4)
  ioports I/O port usage
- kcore Kernel core image (can be ELF or A.OUT)
+ irq Masks for irq to cpu affinity (2.4)(smp?)
+ isapnp ISA PnP (Plug&Play) Info (2.4)
+ kcore Kernel core image (can be ELF or A.OUT(depreciated in
2.4))
  kmsg Kernel messages
  ksyms Kernel symbol table
- loadavg Load average
+ loadavg Load average of last 1, 5 & 15 minutes
  locks Kernel locks
  meminfo Memory info
  misc Miscellaneous
@@ -201,14 +210,19 @@
  mounts Mounted filesystems
  net Networking info (see text)
  partitions Table of partitions known to the system
+ pci Depreciated info of PCI bus (new way -> /proc/bus/pci/,
+ decoupled by lspci (2.4)
  rtc Real time clock
  scsi SCSI info (see text)
  slabinfo Slab pool info
  stat Overall statistics
  swaps Swap space utilization
  sys See chapter 2
+ sysvipc Info of SysVIPC Resources (msg, sem, shm) (2.4)
+ tty Info of tty drivers
  uptime System uptime
  version Kernel version
+ video bttv info of video resources (2.4)

..............................................................................
 
 You can, for example, check which interrupts are currently in use
and what
@@ -230,6 +244,68 @@
    15: 7 XT-PIC ide1
   NMI: 0
 
+In 2.4.* a couple of lines where added to this file LOC & ERR (this
time is the
+output of a SMP machine):
+
+ > cat /proc/interrupts
+
+ CPU0 CPU1
+ 0: 1243498 1214548 IO-APIC-edge timer
+ 1: 8949 8958 IO-APIC-edge keyboard
+ 2: 0 0 XT-PIC cascade
+ 5: 11286 10161 IO-APIC-edge soundblaster
+ 8: 1 0 IO-APIC-edge rtc
+ 9: 27422 27407 IO-APIC-edge 3c503
+ 12: 113645 113873 IO-APIC-edge PS/2 Mouse
+ 13: 0 0 XT-PIC fpu
+ 14: 22491 24012 IO-APIC-edge ide0
+ 15: 2183 2415 IO-APIC-edge ide1
+ 17: 30564 30414 IO-APIC-level eth0
+ 18: 177 164 IO-APIC-level bttv
+ NMI: 2457961 2457959
+ LOC: 2457882 2457881
+ ERR: 2155
+
+NMI is incremented in this case because every timer interrupt generates
a NMI
+(Non Maskable Interrupt) which is used by the NMI Watchdog to detect
lookups.
+
+LOC is the local interrupt counter of the internal APIC of every CPU.
+
+ERR is incremented in the case of errors in the IO-APIC bus (the bus
that
+connects the CPUs in a SMP system. This means that an error has been
detected,
+the IO-APIC automatically retry the transmision, so it should not be a
big
+problem, but you should read the SMP-FAQ.
+
+In this context it could be interesting to note the new irq directory
in 2.4.
+It could be used to set IRQ to CPU affinity, this means that you can
"hook" an
+IRQ to only one CPU, or to exclude a CPU of handling IRQs. The contents
of the
+irq subdir is one subdir for each IRQ, and one file; prof_cpu_mask
+
+For example
+ > ls /proc/irq/
+ 0 10 12 14 16 18 2 4 6 8 prof_cpu_mask
+ 1 11 13 15 17 19 3 5 7 9
+ > ls /proc/irq/0/
+ smp_affinity
+
+The contents of the prof_cpu_mask file and each smp_affinity file for
each IRQ
+is the same by default:
+
+ > cat /proc/irq/0/smp_affinity
+ ffffffff
+
+It's a bitmask, in wich you can specify wich CPUs can handle the IRQ,
you can
+set it by doing:
+
+ > echo 1 > /proc/irq/prof_cpu_mask
+
+This means that only the first CPU will handle the IRQ, but you can
also echo 5
+wich means that only the first and fourth CPU can handle the IRQ.
+
+The way IRQs are routed is handled by the IO-APIC, and it's Round Robin
+between all the CPUs which are allowed to handle it. As usual the
kernel has
+more info than you and does a better job than you, so the defaults are
the
+best choice for almost everyone.
 
 There are three more important subdirectories in /proc: net, scsi,
and sys.
 The general rule is that the contents, or even the existence
of these
@@ -1306,6 +1382,15 @@
 
 TCP settings
 ------------
+
+tcp_ecn
+-------
+
+This file controls the use of the ECN bit in the IPv4 headers, this is
a new
+feature about Explicit Congestion Notification, but some routers and
firewalls
+block trafic that has this bit set, so it could be necessary to echo 0
to
+/proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_ecn, if you want to talk to this sites. For more
info
+you could read RFC2481.
 
 tcp_retrans_collapse
 --------------------

-- 
Jorge Nerin
<comandante@zaralinux.com>
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