Subject: Re: why swap at all?
From: FabF <fabian.frederick@skynet.be>
To: Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu
Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org
In-Reply-To: <200406012022.i51KMFEB002660@turing-police.cc.vt.edu>
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Date: Tue, 01 Jun 2004 23:15:36 +0200
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On Tue, 2004-06-01 at 22:22, Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu wrote:
> On Tue, 01 Jun 2004 22:14:26 +0200, FabF said:
> 
> > Boring....You can't have X root layer swapped to disk as it's often used
> > ! Some quick lsof | grep "libX" gives all frontal applications 'swapping
> > sensible' .fuser can do 'user resource reverse'.Kernel _can_ 'appl.
> > resource reverse' as well.
> 
> The point you're missing is that if you use a rule such as "everything using
> libX* isn't swappable", then the X *server* is suddenly the prime candidate for
> swapping out (as it's quite likely the biggest user of memory not using libX*).
> (Anybody who ever had the OOM killer whomp their X server to free up space
> fast when the *real* problem was a cluster of 6 or 8 "large but still smaller
> than the X server" processes knows exactly what I mean... ;)
> 
> > PS: I'm not talking about inactive desktop box.Such box has to be rl 3
> > and is not meant to be user (geek) relevant :)
> 
> So you're saying that I should have kicked my laptop down to runlevel 3 just
> because I went across the hall to the machine room to help get a few servers
> into racks?  Or every time I go into a meeting, or get stuck on a longish phone
> call?
> 
> Also, be *very* careful equating "user" with "geek" - at least some of us are
> trying to produce systems that suit the needs of non-geek users....
> 
	As I said, I think this thread is "becoming offtopic" but what can be
interesting is the swapping problem fragmentation :

	1.Global inactivity (what you're talking about)
	2.Application isolation (what we're talking about).

Geek or not, someone backgrounding an application doesn't want it to
down the box for X seconds some minutes later when it comes back and
such things arrive many times a day.Maybe you've got an idea about a
better rule(s) then ? (I mean for the 2 cases)

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