Interrupts

Plugin: proc.plugin Module: /proc/interrupts

Overview

Monitors /proc/interrupts, a file organized by CPU and then by the type of interrupt. The numbers reported are the counts of the interrupts that have occurred of each type.

An interrupt is a signal to the processor emitted by hardware or software indicating an event that needs immediate attention. The processor then interrupts its current activities and executes the interrupt handler to deal with the event. This is part of the way a computer multitasks and handles concurrent processing.

The types of interrupts include:

• I/O interrupts: These are caused by I/O devices like the keyboard, mouse, printer, etc. For example, when you type something on the keyboard, an interrupt is triggered so the processor can handle the new input.

• Timer interrupts: These are generated at regular intervals by the system's timer circuit. It's primarily used to switch the CPU among different tasks.

• Software interrupts: These are generated by a program requiring disk I/O operations, or other system resources.

• Hardware interrupts: These are caused by hardware conditions such as power failure, overheating, etc.

Monitoring /proc/interrupts can be used for:

• Performance tuning: If an interrupt is happening very frequently, it could be a sign that a device is not configured correctly, or there is a software bug causing unnecessary interrupts. This could lead to system performance degradation.

• System troubleshooting: If you're seeing a lot of unexpected interrupts, it could be a sign of a hardware problem.

• Understanding system behavior: More generally, keeping an eye on what interrupts are occurring can help you understand what your system is doing. It can provide insights into the system's interaction with hardware, drivers, and other parts of the kernel.

This collector is supported on all platforms.

This collector supports collecting metrics from multiple instances of this integration, including remote instances.

Default Behavior

Auto-Detection

This integration doesn't support auto-detection.

Limits

The default configuration for this integration does not impose any limits on data collection.

Performance Impact

The default configuration for this integration is not expected to impose a significant performance impact on the system.

Metrics

Metrics grouped by scope.

The scope defines the instance that the metric belongs to. An instance is uniquely identified by a set of labels.

Per Interrupts instance

This scope has no labels.

Metrics:

Metric	Dimensions	Unit
system.interrupts	a dimension per device	interrupts/s

Per cpu core

Labels:

Label	Description
cpu	TBD

Metrics:

Metric	Dimensions	Unit
cpu.interrupts	a dimension per device	interrupts/s

Alerts

There are no alerts configured by default for this integration.

Setup

Prerequisites

No action required.

Configuration

File

There is no configuration file.

Options

There are no configuration options.

Examples

There are no configuration examples.