[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread] 

List:       netbsd-tech-net
Subject:    Re: netboot and swap
From:       Matthias Drochner <M.Drochner () fz-juelich ! de>
Date:       2002-10-26 15:07:47
[Download RAW message or body]


k.heinz.okt.zwei@onlinehome.de said:
> What benefit do I get from having the swap file available on the
> client as '/swap'?

I don't believe the reason is to have it accessible - if one needs to read
swap (eg for kvm(3)), /dev/drum is used anyway.
If we don't want a lot of specialcasing, there must be _some_
mountpoint. And it should be in the root filesystem because swap
might be needed early. So I'd guess /swap is just a random choice.

> Diskless(8) seems to be more clear by suggesting to create the swap file
> inside the client root file system and just mount it as
>   /swap none swap sw

One practical reason to use the separately mounted file:
I have all swapfiles at one plave on the NFS server. This directory
has a special backup directive to avoid wasting tape:

zel459:/vs1/os/NetBSD/swap> cat .nsr
swapasm: *

[This is for Legato Networker. I believe "swapasm" causes just the
length to be saved - on recovery an empty file is created.]

best regards
Matthias


[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread]