# Viewable estimated.soft\_walltime?

**URL:** <https://community.openpbs.org/t/viewable-estimated-soft-walltime/3963>\
**Category:** Users/Site Administrators\
**Created:** [August 9, 2024, 4:42pm UTC](https://community.openpbs.org/t/viewable-estimated-soft-walltime/3963 "2024-08-09T16:42:51Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![mgasp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3be4f8/32.png) [@mgasp](https://community.openpbs.org/u/mgasp)\
**Post date:** [August 9, 2024, 4:42pm UTC](https://community.openpbs.org/t/viewable-estimated-soft-walltime/3963/1 "2024-08-09T16:42:51Z")

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I’ve set a hook to add a default soft\_walltime to each job (with some checking included to validate that it doesn’t exceed hard walltime). How can i check that soft\_walltime is actually working? The PBS Admin Guide says this (4.9.44 in 20.0.1)

“PBS estimates a new soft walltime, and records the estimate in the job’s estimated.soft\_walltime attribute. The estimated.soft\_walltime job attribute is readable by all, but writable only by PBS.”

estimated.soft\_walltime is not added to the job attributes when the job is overrunning the soft\_walltime. How can i make this viewable to users?

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**Author:** ![adarsh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/f07891/32.png) [@adarsh](https://community.openpbs.org/u/adarsh)\
**Post date:** [August 10, 2024, 5:27pm UTC](https://community.openpbs.org/t/viewable-estimated-soft-walltime/3963/2 "2024-08-10T17:27:43Z")

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```auto
[pbsdata@hn ~]$ qsub -l select=1:ncpus=1 -l walltime=10:00:00 -- /bin/sleep 10000
1002.hn

[pbsdata@hn ~]$ qstat -f 1002 | grep -i walltime
    resources_used.walltime = 00:00:10
    Resource_List.walltime = 10:00:00
    Submit_arguments = -l select=1:ncpus=1 -l walltime=10:00:00 -- /bin/sleep 1

[pbsdata@hn ~]$ exit
logout

[root@hn ~]# qalter -l soft_walltime=02:00:00 1002

[root@hn ~]# su - pbsdata

[pbsdata@hn ~]$ qstat -f 1002 | grep -i walltime
    resources_used.walltime = 00:00:26
    Resource_List.soft_walltime = 02:00:00
    Resource_List.walltime = 10:00:00
    Submit_arguments = -l select=1:ncpus=1 -l walltime=10:00:00 -- /bin/sleep 1

```

1. If the job has a soft\_walltime=02:00:00, no hard walltime set, then if the job exceeds its soft\_walltime, then job is extended by its orignal soft\_walltime, totalling to 04:00:00, and if the job exceeds again, then total is 06:00:00 and so on, job would not be killed
2. If the job has soft\_walltime=01:00:00 and hard walltime=01:30:00 , job has exceeded its soft\_walltime, then job will be terminated once the hard walltime is exceeded.

> [@mgasp](#):
>
> estimated.soft\_walltime is not added to the job attributes when the job is overrunning the soft\_walltime. How can i make this viewable to users?

If the user runs qstat -f or manager/root user runs qstat -f , details of soft\_walltime would be visible.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![mgasp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3be4f8/32.png) [@mgasp](https://community.openpbs.org/u/mgasp)\
**Post date:** [August 15, 2024, 7:52pm UTC](https://community.openpbs.org/t/viewable-estimated-soft-walltime/3963/3 "2024-08-15T19:52:59Z")

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Thanks, i was able to get it to show up after restarting the PBS server.