xref: /dragonfly/share/man/man9/microtime.9 (revision 19fe1c42)
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28.Dd January 3, 2000
29.Dt MICROTIME 9
30.Os
31.Sh NAME
32.Nm microtime ,
33.Nm getmicrotime ,
34.Nm nanotime ,
35.Nm getnanotime
36.Nd get the current time
37.Sh SYNOPSIS
38.In sys/time.h
39.Ft void
40.Fn microtime "struct timeval *tv"
41.Ft void
42.Fn getmicrotime "struct timeval *tv"
43.Ft void
44.Fn nanotime "struct timespec *ts"
45.Ft void
46.Fn getnanotime "struct timespec *tsp"
47.Sh DESCRIPTION
48The
49.Fn microtime
50and
51.Fn getmicrotime
52functions stores the system time as a
53.Ft struct timeval
54at the address specified by
55.Fa tv .
56The
57.Fn nanotime
58and
59.Fn getnanotime
60functions perform the same utility, but record the time as a
61.Ft struct timespec
62instead.
63.Pp
64.Fn Microtime
65and
66.Fn nanotime
67always query the timecounter to return the current time as precisely as
68possible.
69Whereas
70.Fn getmicrotime
71and
72.Fn getnanotime
73functions are abstractions which can alternately return a less precise, but
74faster to obtain, time.
75This behaviour can be toggled via the
76kern.timecounter.method sysctl variable:
77.Bl -tag -width ABC
78.It Dv 0
79sacrifice precision in favor of faster code execution
80.It Dv 1
81return the more precise time (the same as calling
82.Fn microtime
83or
84.Fn nanotime ) .
85.El
86.Pp
87The intent of the
88.Fn getmicrotime
89and
90.Fn getnanotime
91functions is to enforce the user's preference for timer accuracy versus
92execution time.
93.Sh DIAGNOSTICS
94Buggy hardware can cause "calcru negative..." when kern.timecounter.method
95is set to 0.
96.Sh SEE ALSO
97.Xr getmicrouptime 9 ,
98.Xr getnanouptime 9 ,
99.Xr microuptime 9 ,
100.Xr nanouptime 9 ,
101.Xr tvtohz 9
102.Sh HISTORY
103The
104.Nm
105and
106.Nm nanotime
107functions first appeared in
108.Fx 3.0
109but existed in other incarnations since
110.Bx 4.4
111.Sh AUTHORS
112This manual page was written by
113.An Kelly Yancey Aq kbyanc@posi.net .
114