first off, this list is for gcc, not general programming. p needs to have storage allocated. here is a safer way to do it: #include <sched.h> #include <stdio.h> int main () { struct sched_param p; /* set soft real-time scheduling */ sched_getparam(0,&p); p.sched_priority = 50; if (sched_setscheduler(0,SCHED_FIFO,&p)) fprintf(stderr,"Could not change scheduler settings\n"); return 0; } HTH, bud davis