====== Proc - Interrupts file ======

You can check which interrupts are currently in use and what they are used for by looking in the file **/proc/interrupts**:

<code bash>
cat /proc/interrupts 

             CPU0        
    0:    8728810          XT-PIC  timer 
    1:        895          XT-PIC  keyboard 
    2:          0          XT-PIC  cascade 
    3:     531695          XT-PIC  aha152x 
    4:    2014133          XT-PIC  serial 
    5:      44401          XT-PIC  pcnet_cs 
    8:          2          XT-PIC  rtc 
   11:          8          XT-PIC  i82365 
   12:     182918          XT-PIC  PS/2 Mouse 
   13:          1          XT-PIC  fpu 
   14:    1232265          XT-PIC  ide0 
   15:          7          XT-PIC  ide1 
  NMI:          0 
</code>

In 2.4.* a couple of lines where added to this file **LOC** & **ERR** (this time is the output of a SMP machine):

<code bash>
cat /proc/interrupts 

             CPU0       CPU1       
    0:    1243498    1214548    IO-APIC-edge  timer
    1:       8949       8958    IO-APIC-edge  keyboard
    2:          0          0          XT-PIC  cascade
    5:      11286      10161    IO-APIC-edge  soundblaster
    8:          1          0    IO-APIC-edge  rtc
    9:      27422      27407    IO-APIC-edge  3c503
   12:     113645     113873    IO-APIC-edge  PS/2 Mouse
   13:          0          0          XT-PIC  fpu
   14:      22491      24012    IO-APIC-edge  ide0
   15:       2183       2415    IO-APIC-edge  ide1
   17:      30564      30414   IO-APIC-level  eth0
   18:        177        164   IO-APIC-level  bttv
  NMI:    2457961    2457959 
  LOC:    2457882    2457881 
  ERR:       2155
</code>

where:

  * **NMI** is incremented in this case because every timer interrupt generates a NMI (Non Maskable Interrupt) which is used by the NMI Watchdog to detect lockups.

  * **LOC** is the local interrupt counter of the internal APIC of every CPU.

  * **ERR** is incremented in the case of errors in the IO-APIC bus (the bus that connects the CPUs in a SMP system.  This means that an error has been detected, the IO-APIC automatically retry the transmission, so it should not be a big problem, but you should read the SMP-FAQ.

In 2.6.2* /proc/interrupts was expanded again.  This time the goal was for /proc/interrupts to display every IRQ vector in use by the system, not just those considered 'most important'.  The new vectors are:

  * **THR** interrupt raised when a machine check threshold counter (typically counting ECC corrected errors of memory or cache) exceeds a configurable threshold.  Only available on some systems.
  * **TRM** a thermal event interrupt occurs when a temperature threshold has been exceeded for the CPU.  This interrupt may also be generated when the temperature drops back to normal.
  * **SPU** a spurious interrupt is some interrupt that was raised then lowered by some IO device before it could be fully processed by the APIC.  Hence the APIC sees the interrupt but does not know what device it came from.  For this case the APIC will generate the interrupt with a IRQ vector of 0xff. This might also be generated by chipset bugs.
  * **RES**, **CAL**, **TLB** rescheduling, call and TLB flush interrupts are sent from one CPU to another per the needs of the OS.  Typically, their statistics are used by kernel developers and interested users to determine the occurrence of interrupts of the given type.