
NAME
nicer -- change priority of running program

SYNOPSIS
nicer -<pri> <pid> [<pid> .... <pid>]

DESCRIPTION
"nicer" allows any user to lower the priority of a process  which
is  already  running.   The  new  "nice"  value  may be any value
between the current value and 30 (lowest possible).   For  super-
user, any value between -128 and 127 is allowed.

The first argument to "nicer" is  the  new  "nice"  value.   This
value  must  be  preceeded  with a minus sign, e.g. "-10" means a
"nice" value of 10.  Negative "nice" values (usually only allowed
to the super-user) are specified with two minus signs e.g. "--10"
means a "nice" value of -10.  Higher  "nice"  values  mean  lower
priority; thus, a program with a "nice" of 20 will run at a lower
priority than one with a "nice" of 10.

The other arguments to  "nicer"  are  the  process  id's  of  the
processes  to  be  affected.  Only processes owned by the current
user may be affected.  Pid 0 causes all processes running at  the
terminal with the current user-id to be affected.

An initial "nice" value can be assigned  with  the  program  NICE
(I).  The current "nice" values can be obtained with the command:
% ps l

Lowering the priority of  long-running  programs,  especially  if
they  are  left running after you log out, is greatly appreciated
since it reduces system load and  improves  system  response  for
other users.


EXAMPLES
nicer -5 333 -- change "nice" of process 333 to 5
nicer -10 0 -- change "nice" of all processes at this tty to 10

CAUTION
Since only the super-user may raise the priorities  via  "nicer",
once  you  have  lowered  your  priority with "nicer" you may not
raise it again.  Thus, if you had:

nicer -20 333

subsequent calls to "nicer" may only raise the  nice  (lower  the
priority) to a number between 20 and 30.

SEE ALSO
nice (I), nice(II), nicer(II)

BUGS
