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<!DOCTYPE article PUBLIC "-//KDE//DTD DocBook XML V4.2-Based Variant V1.1//EN"
"dtd/kdex.dtd" [
<!ENTITY % addindex "IGNORE">
<!ENTITY % British-English "INCLUDE"
> <!-- change language only here -->
]>

<article lang="&language;">
<title
>Interrupt Request (<abbrev
>IRQ</abbrev
>) Lines</title>
<articleinfo>

<authorgroup>
<author
>&Matthias.Hoelzer-Kluepfel;</author>
<author
>&Helge.Deller;</author>
<author
>&Duncan.Haldane;</author>
<author
>&Mike.McBride;</author>
<othercredit role="translator"
><firstname
>Malcolm</firstname
><surname
>Hunter</surname
><affiliation
><address
><email
>malcolm.hunter@gmx.co.uk</email
></address
></affiliation
><contrib
>Conversion to British English</contrib
></othercredit
> 
</authorgroup>

<date
>2002-02-12</date>
<releaseinfo
>3.00.00</releaseinfo>

<keywordset>
<keyword
>KDE</keyword>
<keyword
>KControl</keyword>
<keyword
>IRQ</keyword>
<keyword
>interrupts</keyword>
<keyword
>system information</keyword>
</keywordset>
</articleinfo>

<sect1>
<title
>Interrupt Request (<abbrev
>IRQ</abbrev
>) Lines in Use</title>

<para
>This page displays information about the Interrupt Request Lines in use, and the devices that use them.</para>

<para
>An <acronym
>IRQ</acronym
> is a hardware line used in a <acronym
>PC</acronym
> by (<acronym
>ISA</acronym
> bus) devices like keyboards, modems, sound cards, &etc;, to send interrupt signals to the processor to tell it that the device is ready to send or accept data. Unfortunately, there are only sixteen <acronym
>IRQ</acronym
>'s (0-15) available in the i386 (<acronym
>PC</acronym
>) architecture for sharing among the various <acronym
>ISA</acronym
> devices.</para>

<para
>Many hardware problems are the result of <acronym
>IRQ</acronym
> conflicts, when two devices try to use the same <acronym
>IRQ</acronym
>, or software is misconfigured to use a different <acronym
>IRQ</acronym
> from the one a device is actually configured for.</para>

<note
><para
>The exact information displayed is system-dependent. On some systems, <acronym
>IRQ</acronym
> information cannot be displayed yet.</para
></note>

<para
>On &Linux;, this information is read from <filename class="directory"
>/proc/interrupts</filename
>, which is only available if the <filename class="directory"
>/proc</filename
> pseudo-filesystem is compiled into the kernel.</para>

<para
>The first column, is the <acronym
>IRQ</acronym
> number. The second column, is the number of interrupts that have been received since the last reboot. The third column shows the type of interrupt. The fourth, identifies the device assigned to that interrupt.</para>

<para
>The user cannot modify any settings on this page.</para>

</sect1>

</article>

