Talk:CPU time

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definition is wrong

CPU time or CPU usage is the amount of time a computer program uses in processing central processing unit (CPU) instructions, as opposed to, for example, waiting for input/output operations. and is also a CPU usage

This is wrong because wait states are usually included in the CPU time, because the CPU is still used from a software point-of-view. CPU time is usually mesured as the time, where the system idle task is not running. --MrBurns (talk) 23:41, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The concept of CPU time is most crisp and clear if it does not require the reader to understand wait states or the system idle task. I think a good guide here is the Unix API, where User time and System time are defined in basic terms. Knowing that programs use OS services, and further that the OS can preempt the user program, is detail enough. JamieJennings (talk) 18:10, 22 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I made somewhat extensive edits yesterday due to definitional issues. The article earlier contained a misconception about CPU time measurements, which is that they can be used to compare algorithms. There were also some off-topic points that seemed to detract from the main point. Oddly, I was not prompted to write a description of my edits (or it went by without notice -- I am still new to editing). Apologies if I misunderstood the relevance of something I removed. I once taught computer architecture to undergraduate engineering students, and I tried to apply those lessons to my edits. JamieJennings (talk) 18:27, 22 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Unix commands

Only Unix commands are mentioned. This article ought to mention commands for other operating systems. Otherwise the section should be tagged with {{undue weight}}.

I totally agree with the above comment. The article should insist more on definition, characterization and other generalities that are valid across all operating systems. It should also clearly define user time, system time and steal time, before showing how these values can be found out on different operating systems. Cristiklein (talk) 08:04, 21 August 2013 (UTC)[reply]

scheduled time

Could someone please read this article article and work the insights into this wikipedia article? I'm not deep enough into this topic to do that by myself. --IUniversEi (talk) 08:19, 8 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]

That article is a personal blog, so it's probably not a reliable source. The crux of it can be boiled down to one sentence: "When a process tells you it got 1 second of CPU time, the 1 second could have been really used by 8 other processes alltogether (sic) [depending on the operating system]". This seems more appropriate for an errata or bugs section about the operating system, not the concept of CPU time. — Loadmaster (talk) 16:31, 8 October 2012 (UTC)[reply]