On Mon, 2005-01-10 at 15:52 -0500, Robert W. Fuller wrote:-
Hi,
I was wondering if some functionality existed in Linux. Specifically, in Solaris, you can mmap the null device in order to reserve part of the address space without otherwise consuming resources. This is detailed in the Solaris manpage null(7D). The same functionality is also available under Windows NT/XP/2K by calling the VirtualAlloc function with the MEM_RESERVE flag omitting the MEM_COMMIT flag. Does Linux have a similar mechanism buried somewhere whereby I can reserve a part of the address space and not increase the "virtual size" of the process or the system's idea of the amount of memory in use? I could not find one by using the source.
malloc() already does this...
what you describe is the default behavior of linux; only when you
actually write to the memory does it get backed by ram.