On Wednesday, November 9, 2011, Gauthier, Dave wrote: > Hi:**** > > ** ** > > PG v4.8.3 on Linux**** > > ** ** > > I'm using "selcet procpid,current_query from pg_stat_activity" to monitor > activity during times when "top" is showing many PG procs with very high > cpu usage numbers (all cores at or above 90%). Some of these are procs > that map to PG connections with current_query = <IDLE>.**** > > ** ** > > What scenarios could explain a process identified as IDLE consuming lots > of CPU?**** > > ** ** > > More clues... In parallel with these was a user that was making a series > of insert/delete/update commands that fire off triggers that generate more > DML recursively. Some of the idles are "<IDLE> in transaction". >
My guess would be something running lots and lots of really short queries. top will give you an averate CPU usage over an interval, but pg_stat_activity shows a snapshot. So probably the sessions were running simple things, but just at the moment pg_stat_activity "hits", it wasn't doing anything. -- Magnus Hagander Me: http://www.hagander.net/ Work: http://www.redpill-linpro.com/
