`|   Date: 10-14-96    Time: 10:16a     Number: 936    
||   From: DAVID NOON                    Refer:         
||     To: LEE ARONER                 Board ID: GREY-BBS        Reply:    
||Subject: DOS OS/2 Advice ??             2585: OS/2 Prog      Status: Public 
||-----------------------------------------------------------------------------


DN> On Saturday, 96/10/12, LEE ARONER wrote to JONATHAN DE BOYNE POLLARD
  > about "DOS OS/2 Advice ??" as follows:

LA>    I don't see it that way....what I want to do is relinquish the 
LA>    remainder of a slice, when I don't need *all* of it.....that's 
LA>    different from saying you have *no* usefull work to do...DV could 
LA>    do this, why not OS/2 ?

DN> Hi Lee,

DN> If your thread has useful work to do then why relinquish the
  > timeslice? We have preemptive thread management and if a higher
  > priority thread becomes ready, yours will be preempted at the end of
  > its current timeslice. Simply adjust your thread's priority so that it
  > doesn't steal CPU cycles from more important work.

   Dave, I appreciate the advice, but this was concerning a DOS app. 
   What I'm looking for is an Int call that OS/2 will interprete as 
   a priority downgrade, without totally shutting the application 
   off.

DN> Alternatively, if your thread has run out of work to do but is
  > expecting more then it should block on an event semaphore. When the
  > new work arrives the submitting thread should post the event and your
  > thread will resume. In the interim it will consume no CPU cycles at all,
  > regardless of its priority.

DN> Simply releasing timeslices smacks of polling. However, if you want to
  > do it you simply use the DosSleep() API for a time less than 1
  > timeslice, which is typically 32 milliseconds under OS/2. However,
  > this seems like a bad way to design an app for OS/2. Don't poll; use
  > threads.

   It's a DOS app, not an event-driven specialty OS app...it *has* 
   to poll for input at some point.

   My app uses internal multi-tasking to compensate for being
   portable. It knows when it's busy, and when it's wasting 
   processor time waiting for a keystroke.

   This is a DOS app, because it's the closest thing there is right 
   now to a portable exe format....it'll run under any OS, while 
   still taking advantage of specific OS features. Now if I could 
   just get the *best* multitasker to treat it as an *intelligent* 
   exe, I'll be happy.

   Got any ideas ?  What I want is that secret Int call that OS/2 
   will treat as an instruction to take the rest of the slice 
   away...but don't put me so far to sleep that I can't wake up 
   again without keyboard intercession.

                                       L.A.


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