Sendmail, 3rd Edition

Name

LA_TYPE

Synopsis

The load average is the average number of blocked processes (processes that are runnable but not able to run because of a lack of resources) over the last minute. The sendmail program can vary its behavior appropriately as the load average changes. Thresholds for change are defined by the options shown in Table 24-9.

The method that is used to get the current load average from the operating system varies widely. This LA_TYPE definition determines which method to use. It is correctly defined inside sendmail/conf.h for all currently supported operating systems. Porting sendmail to a new system might require that you define LA_TYPE yourself. The possible values and their meanings are shown in Table 3-5.

Table 3-5. LA_ Methods for getting the load average

LA_	Does what
LA_ZERO	Always returns 0. Essentially disables load average checking. This is portable to all systems.
LA_INT	Read /dev/kmem for the symbol avenrun. If found, interpret the result as a native (usually long) integer.
LA_FLOAT	Read /dev/kmem for the symbol avenrun. If found, interpret the result as a floating-point value.
LA_SHORT	Read /dev/kmem for the symbol avenrun. If found, interpret the result as a short integer.
LA_SUBR	Call the library routine getloadavg(3) and use the result returned.
LA_MACH	Call the MACH-specific processor_set_info(2) routine and use the result returned.
LA_PROCSTR	Read the Linux-specific /proc/loadavg file and interpret the result as a floating-point ...