Subject: Small RSS for Xsun? and malloc tip..
To: None <port-sparc@NetBSD.ORG>
From: Jake Hamby <hamby@aris.jpl.nasa.gov>
List: port-sparc
Date: 05/29/1996 11:22:32
I've noticed that ps and top seem to report an abnormally small RSS (224k)
for the X11R6.1 X server (Xsun).  This is on a SPARC 2 with 64MB RAM
running NetBSD 1.2-ALPHA.  Because I'm not using any of the swap
partition, the entire server should be resident in RAM, but perhaps I
don't understand the VM system well enough, and this is an appropriate
value?  Answers?

BTW, the VSZ usage of Xsun is approximately halved when you link it with
-lgnumalloc instead of the wasteful BSD malloc in libc.  This should
probably be patched into the default NetBSD.cf as it is for FreeBSD.  As
an aside, FreeBSD has recently integrated a very efficient malloc (from
Poul-Henning Kamp) directly into their libc, eliminating the need for
gnumalloc, an example NetBSD may want to follow.

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