Subject: Re: swap into the void?
To: None <current-users@netbsd.org, tech-kern@netbsd.org>
From: Greg A. Woods <woods@weird.com>
List: current-users
Date: 08/02/2002 00:11:02
[ On Thursday, August 1, 2002 at 19:39:26 (-0700), Chuck Silvers wrote: ]
> Subject: Re: swap into the void?
>
> "swapped out" doesn't mean what you think it does. :-)
>
> these days, "swapped out" just means that the pages for that process's
> kernel stack are allowed to be written to swap and freed, not that this
> has necessarily happened. the reason why it isn't actually happening
> is that the memory usage-balancing code sees that there's not enough
> swap-backed memory in use to warrant reusing any of it yet, so the pages
> stay in memory.
If it hasn't happened then why are the process start times no longer
available? If it has happened, why aren't the blocks accounted for in
units shown as "used" by "swapctl"?
BTW, any chance we can get the start times move back into struct proc so
that they don't go missing? I'd really like to do this, but it's a bit
much to maintain on my own as a local patch....
> On Fri, Aug 02, 2002 at 01:30:15AM +0200, Christian Groessler wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm currently doing a build of the 1.6 branch on my macppc machine,
> > and I notice that "ps -aux" reports the original ./build.sh as being
> > swapped out:
> >
> > root 14166 0.0 0.4 544 1068 p1 SN+ 1:08AM 0:00.11 /usr/local/tools/bin/nbmake install BUILD_tools n
> > root 14165 0.0 0.0 612 376 p1 SWN+ - 0:00.00 /bin/sh -ec (cd /local/netbsdsrc-1.6/src && /usr/
> > root 18795 0.0 0.0 556 1060 p1 SWN+ - 0:00.00 /usr/local/tools/bin/nbmake do-build
> > root 18794 0.0 0.0 612 376 p1 SWN+ - 0:00.00 /bin/sh -ec (cd /local/netbsdsrc-1.6/src && /usr/
> > root 1071 0.0 0.0 492 1068 p1 SWN+ - 0:00.00 /usr/local/tools/bin/nbmake build
> > root 261 0.0 0.0 636 460 p1 SWN+ - 0:00.00 /bin/sh ./build.sh
> > root 248 0.0 0.0 764 916 p1 SWs - 0:00.00 bash
> > root 247 0.0 0.4 412 948 ?? Ss 12:08AM 0:04.93 SCREEN (screen-3.9.10)
> >
> > but at the same time "swapctl -lk" tells me
> >
> > bash-2.05# swapctl -lk
> > Device 1K-blocks Used Avail Capacity Priority
> > /dev/wd1b 1048576 0 1048576 0% 0
> >
> > No swap space used!?
> >
> > Where are the swapped out processes swapped to?
> >
> > confused,
> > chris
>
--
Greg A. Woods
+1 416 218-0098; <g.a.woods@ieee.org>; <woods@robohack.ca>
Planix, Inc. <woods@planix.com>; VE3TCP; Secrets of the Weird <woods@weird.com>