On Sun, 1 Apr 2012 04:45:08 -0400 Auguste Pop <auguste@xxxxxxxxx> wrote: > anyway, i think the following command can easily get the information > you need: grep -c processor /proc/cpuinfo This command will make a few 2 Cores processor with some kind of virtual processing technology (like hyper-threading) to be counted as a 4 cores processor. You may use: #cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep "physical id" | sort | uniq | wc -l To get the number of CPU "slots" you have on the machine. And then: #cat /proc/cpuinfo | grep "cpu cores" | uniq To get the number of cores per "slot". Then you just have to multiply both numbers and you know how many "real cpus" you have on the system. Otherwise you may be counting virtual processors, which shouldn't be used for heavy stuff such as compiling. Regards, Vitor