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List:       linux-arm-kernel
Subject:    Re: Disabling kswapd
From:       Erik Mouw <erik () bitwizard ! nl>
Date:       2004-06-11 9:45:49
Message-ID: 20040611094549.GA21336 () bitwizard ! nl
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On Thu, Jun 10, 2004 at 03:20:14PM -0700, Michael Moedt wrote:
> I noticed a bunch of threads called 'kswapd' running
> around on my system.  I'm not using any swapspace
> (this is an embedded, ARM-based system!).

You do, but you don't realise: when you execute /bin/sh and memory
presure becomes high, the VM system will get rid of pages used by the
.text segments of the binaries. IOW: it's used as file backed swap. The
swapspace is for anonymous memory (memory you allocate with malloc()).

> Has anyone tried disabling kswapd, or better, not even
> compiling it into the kernel?

No, and you shouldn't do that. Kswapd is a crucial kernel thread for
the VM system.


Erik

-- 
----  Erik Mouw  ----  www.bitwizard.nl  ----  +31 15 2600 998  ----

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