Executive V2.0

TITLE

  Executive

VERSION

  2.00 (October 28, 1996)

AUTHOR

  Petri Nordlund (petrin@megabaud.fi)
  (http://www.megabaud.fi/~petrin/)

DESCRIPTION

  Executive brings real multitasking to AmigaOS. Executive is a
  UNIX-like process scheduler for Amiga. It also has plenty of
  other features previously available only in larger operating
  systems.

  Executive improves the responsiveness of your Amiga. One CPU
  intensive application no longer causes the whole system to crawl.
  You can start many CPU intensive applications and the system
  still feels as if it would be totally idle.

  The Executive package also includes many useful client programs
  that let you control tasks and monitor what is going on in your
  system.

  The core of Executive is a scheduler that recalculates task
  priorities based on system load average and task's recent CPU
  usage. The scheduler will give high priority to interactive
  tasks and low priority to CPU intensive tasks.

  Lets say you are printing a document from a word processor. You
  can't do much else while the document is being printed. This
  isn't multitasking. With Executive you could also do some heavy
  rendering and C-compiling in the background at the same time.
  You could surf the web with your favorite browser without even
  noticing all these programs running in the background.

  Executive consists of a server and clients. The server is run
  in the background and it takes care of scheduling, CPU usage
  calculations and many other things. Some important features of
  the server:

    - precise (1/1000 seconds) CPU usage timing
    - six different scheduling algorithms
    - load averages
    - process identifiers
    - process group identifiers
    - accounting
    - focus - task with active window gets more CPU time
    - MultiUser support

  The client programs are:

    Acct            Accounting daemon
    ALoad           Display load average or CPU usage
    ALoad3D         Display load averages in 3D
    Commander       General task manager
    Ctp             Extended ChangeTaskPri
    Dashboard       The mother of all meters
    Kill            Extended Break
    Lastcomm        List last commands executed
    Meter           Display system information
    Nice            Run programs with lower scheduling priority
    Ps              Process status displayer
    Pstree          Display child-parent relationships
    Renice          Renice a task
    Sa              Display accounting statistics
    Stat            Display some misc. information
    Timer           Time shell and Workbench programs
    Top             Display information about top CPU tasks
    Uptime          Display system uptime and load averages

  Executive is fully compatible with all Amiga computers running
  AmigaOS release 2.04 or newer.

  Executive is the highest rated item of shareware CU Amiga
  magazine has ever awarded at 98%.

NEW FEATURES

  - Schedulers have been improved and a real multi-level feedback
    queue scheduler, found on most UNIX systems, is now available.

  - New client, Dashboard, lets you open multiple windows and
    interactively create all kinds of meters on them and adjust
    their parameters. Everything is user configurable.

  - PatchControl and ScreenNotify support.

  - CPU usage can be displayed with Amiga's power LED.

  - The server and some clients are now commodities. Scheduling
    can be disabled and enabled without restarting the server.

  - ExecutiveAPI is a new low-level API for application programs
    that wish to directly control scheduling.

  - Tasks can now be scheduled as a group, if necessary.

SPECIAL REQUIREMENTS

  AmigaOS 2.04 or newer is required to run Executive.

AVAILABILITY

  Any Aminet site, for example:

  ftp://ftp.luth.se/pub/aminet/util/misc/Executive.lha

  Executive has a WWW-page which has links to several Aminet
  sites and also some nice screenshots. The URL of the page is:

  http://www.megabaud.fi/~petrin/Executive.html

PRICE

  The freely redistributable version doesn't lack any crucial
  features so it can be used without registering. Registered
  users get process accounting, ALoad3D and Meter clients and
  5 additional scheduling algorithms. Registration fee is $15
  and it's also accepted in many other currencies.

DISTRIBUTABILITY

  Copyright © 1995-96 Petri Nordlund, freely redistributable.

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