idle() is an internal system
call used during bootstrap. It marks the process's pages as
swappable, lowers its priority, and enters the main
scheduling loop. idle() never
returns.
Only process 0 may call idle(). Any user process, even a process
with superuser permission, will receive EPERM.
RETURN VALUE
idle() never returns for
process 0, and always returns −1 for a user
process.
ERRORS
EPERM
Always, for a user process.
VERSIONS
Since Linux 2.3.13, this system call does not exist
anymore.
CONFORMING TO
This function is Linux-specific, and should not be used in
programs intended to be portable.
COLOPHON
This page is part of release 5.11 of the Linux man-pages project. A
description of the project, information about reporting bugs,
and the latest version of this page, can be found at
https://www.kernel.org/doc/man−pages/.
Copyright 1993 Rickard E. Faith (faith@cs.unc.edu)
Portions extracted from linux/mm/swap.c:
Copyright (C) 1991, 1992 Linus Torvalds
%%%LICENSE_START(VERBATIM)
Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this
manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are
preserved on all copies.
Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this
manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided that the
entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a
permission notice identical to this one.
Since the Linux kernel and libraries are constantly changing, this
manual page may be incorrect or out-of-date. The author(s) assume no
responsibility for errors or omissions, or for damages resulting from
the use of the information contained herein. The author(s) may not
have taken the same level of care in the production of this manual,
which is licensed free of charge, as they might when working
professionally.
Formatted or processed versions of this manual, if unaccompanied by
the source, must acknowledge the copyright and authors of this work.
%%%LICENSE_END
Modified 21 Aug 1994 by Michael Chastain <mec@shell.portal.com>:
Added text about calling restriction (new in kernel 1.1.20 I believe).
N.B. calling "idle" from user process used to hang process!
Modified Thu Oct 31 14:41:15 1996 by Eric S. Raymond <esr@thyrsus.com>
"