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Date: Tue, 17 Apr 2001 12:07:56 -0400
From: Disconnect <lkml@sigkill.net>
To: Linux Kernel Development <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: RFC: pageable kernel-segments
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On Tue, 17 Apr 2001, Heusden, Folkert van did have cause to say:

> I would think is usable (for example) for my 8MB ram laptop.
> Anyone any thoughts on this?

I'm not a kernel hacker, but I've got some thoughts on this:

1> Modules (with the autoloader) can do that for anything not necessary to
boot. (Although even modules could lose a few pages after they
load/init/etc.  Hardware setup tends to only happen once..)

2> It'd be great for embedded systems.  But you'd need a "scale" -
something along the lines of "Page this out, compress it, step on it,
forget it, we'll never need it in a hurry" up through "page this out if
you -absolutely- have to, but make it easily accessible as fast as
possible".

3> It would involve a major kernel rewrite before it was anything more
than a slowdown to a few drivers supporting it.  And there would probably
need to be some /proc method of forbidding paging on certain
(modules/segments/etc) so that, for example, people who hit the
least-likely-path (most-likely-to-page-out) on a regular basis can disable
paging of that section/module/driver/whatnot.


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