1.\" Copyright (c) 1980, 1990, 1993 2.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 3.\" 4.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 5.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 6.\" are met: 7.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 8.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 9.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 11.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 12.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 13.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 14.\" without specific prior written permission. 15.\" 16.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 17.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 18.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 19.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 20.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 21.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 22.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 23.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 24.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 25.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 26.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 27.\" 28.Dd February 24, 2011 29.Dt NICE 1 30.Os 31.Sh NAME 32.Nm nice 33.Nd execute a utility at an altered scheduling priority 34.Sh SYNOPSIS 35.Nm 36.Op Fl n Ar increment 37.Ar utility 38.Op Ar argument ... 39.Sh DESCRIPTION 40The 41.Nm 42utility runs 43.Ar utility 44at an altered scheduling priority, by incrementing its 45.Dq nice 46value by the specified 47.Ar increment , 48or a default value of 10. 49The lower the nice value of a process, the higher its scheduling priority. 50.Pp 51The superuser may specify a negative increment in order to run a utility 52with a higher scheduling priority. 53.Pp 54Some shells may provide a builtin 55.Nm 56command which is similar or identical to this utility. 57Consult the 58.Xr builtin 1 59manual page. 60.Sh ENVIRONMENT 61The 62.Ev PATH 63environment variable is used to locate the requested 64.Ar utility 65if the name contains no 66.Ql / 67characters. 68.Sh EXIT STATUS 69If 70.Ar utility 71is invoked, the exit status of 72.Nm 73is the exit status of 74.Ar utility . 75.Pp 76An exit status of 126 indicates 77.Ar utility 78was found, but could not be executed. 79An exit status of 127 indicates 80.Ar utility 81could not be found. 82.Sh EXAMPLES 83Execute utility 84.Sq date 85at priority 5 assuming the priority of the 86shell is 0: 87.Pp 88.Dl "nice -n 5 date" 89.Pp 90Execute utility 91.Sq date 92at priority -19 assuming the priority of the 93shell is 0 and you are the super-user: 94.Pp 95.Dl "nice -n 16 nice -n -35 date" 96.Sh COMPATIBILITY 97The traditional 98.Fl Ns Ar increment 99option has been deprecated but is still supported. 100.Sh SEE ALSO 101.Xr builtin 1 , 102.Xr csh 1 , 103.Xr idprio 1 , 104.Xr rtprio 1 , 105.Xr getpriority 2 , 106.Xr setpriority 2 , 107.Xr renice 8 108.Sh STANDARDS 109The 110.Nm 111utility conforms to 112.St -p1003.1-2001 . 113.Sh HISTORY 114A 115.Nm 116utility appeared in 117.At v4 . 118