I was able to solve my problem of lack of memory that way.
---Jan Gyselinck <JAN.GYSELINCK@student.kuleuven.ac.be> wrote:
>
> Hi all
>
> My experience comes from a 2.1.89 kernel. While the following may not
> apply anymore, my conclusions will still apply for newer kernels, so
read
> on.
>
> A got a P75 portable with 16 megs. The memory-code (or the thing that
> loves to put things in swap) in .89 thinks is should keep something
like 5
> to 6 meg as a cache. That leaves me with 10 megs of memory, and
some 1.5
> megs is already taken by the kernel. Imagine: you're compiling
something,
> you're bzipping something (and that needs 8.5 meg), so if you do that,
> you'll know what swapping is. Even a sole bzip can't run without
> swapping, with used to run without (or with some swapping in the
> beginning, but never while running).
>
> I think that the people who designed this 'feature' did one thing
wrong.
> Namely they turned things around. Memory is not made to use if as a
> cache, it's used to run programs from. Programs are not made to be
run
> from swap.
>
> Now, 5 meg as a cache, isn't that too much?? Some people think this
is
> needed, well I can tell you, it isn't. A year ago, I did some
testing on
> a 486DX33 with 8 meg, running DOS/winslows 3.11. I tried different
> cache-sizes (with pc-cache) and measured the speedup while starting up
> MS-Word. Maybe you think that's not the way to test this, but why
not?
> You test the speed-up in real-life applications, because that's what
you
> do all day. So, speedup from 0 to 64 kB cache, 20 seconds, from 64
to 128
> kB cache, 14 seconds, from 128 to 256 kB, 6 seconds, from 256 to 512
kB, 3
> seconds, and from 512 to 1024 kB, 1 second. Now why in gods name
would
> one want 5 meg of cache? It will increase the speed of
disk-activity with
> maybe 1 second of a 2,5 meg cache. My oppinion is that for 16 meg of
> memory, the minimum-limit for a disk-cache should be 256kB, not 5
meg!!
>
> Okay, you say, but what about all those idling programs that are
stuck in
> memory, and just take up memory from the cache. I know, I know,
there are
> cases where it's needed to run such programs, but not always.
People are
> running to many idle programs these days! Why do you think there is a
> inet-daemon? So that there don't need to be a dozen idle processes
who
> are checking if there isn't something knocking on there port.
Running 6
> or more agetty's? There exists something like a console spawn
daemon, you
> push a key-combination, and there opens a new console.
>
> If I run a bash on a console, and I do something on another console
for a
> while, and I return to the first one, I want the bash-process to
respond
> immediatly to my key-strokes. I don't like to wait for it until it's
> loaded from swap. My opinion is this: if I run something, it is
because
> it needs to run, and it must be able to respond immediatly. If this
is
> not so, I wont run it. I don't have memory to throw around, I need
every
> bit. (And no, memory for a portable is not that cheap)
>
> So think about this, when you people change something in the
> memory-management of linux, because it'll run on low-budget and
> high-budget systems...
>
>
> Jan Gyselink
> for the moment a swapping linux-user
>
> PS: i hope .90 is better, 'll try it tonight, but after I rebooted,
> because my console is messed up by Xwindows, who didn't restore the
state
> after it finished (maybe caused by to much swapping?????)
>
>
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