[linux-audio-dev] new realtime scheduling policy

[Paul Davis]

>Anyway, I think this patch has its place on linux-kernel. It will most likely 
>be rejected but it shows that people are interested in these issues...
>(Who knows Ingo might get another bright idea... :-)

i agree, but i also raise another angle that i spoke about a couple of
times at zkm this last weekend.

using SCHED_(USER)?FIFO makes no sense if you do not also call
mlockall(2). both (scheduling+memory pinning) are inaccessible without
root or CAP_SYS_RESOURCE capabilities. i think that a very useful
patch would be one that used /proc/sys/kernel/rtperm (or some similar
name) to turn on or off the ability of regular processes to acquire
these "resources". this would then allow us to use SCHED_FIFO,
mlockall(2) and any future SCHED_.+FIFO policies without the absurd
hoops that many people have to jump through at the moment.

it would be a very simple patch, i believe, touching just 2
non-hotspots in the kernel. and credit should be given to whoever it
was in the audience who suggested using /proc ... that wasn't really
my idea at all.

--p