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linuxmultithreadingoperating-systemthread-priority

Process Priority vs Thread Priority

In Linux, a process is a set of threads. Each thread has its own priority! But does a process have a priority too? If so, how is it different from the thread priority? And when a new process is created, how are these values propagated?

Solution

  • Linux implements (kernel level) Threads essentially as Processes. So you fall back to the good old process-priorities there.

    See NPTL and nice (for understanding that processes are the first ones to have priorities). Mostly defaults are applied - in case of threads, the thread is a copy, so its priorities should be copied too. Will certainly vary with varying schedulers.