Charles Curley wrote:
> I have come across what I believe to be a misstatement of information in
> an Microsoft publication about Linux. In an unsigned article article
> entitled Linux Myths posted October 4, 1999 and last updated Monday,
> November 01, 1999, Microsoft says, "Linux performance and scalability is
> [sic] architecturally limited in the 2.2 Kernel. ... The Linux SWAP file
> is limited to 128 MB."
> (http://www.microsoft.com/NTServer/nts/news/msnw/LinuxMyths.asp).
>
> This statement is demonstrably false. 1) The statement implies that Linux
> only supports one swap file. It supports 8. 2) The new version of the swap
> file format supports much larger swap files on i86 architecture, and 3)
> even the older version of the swap file format supported almost .5GB on
> other architectures.
>
> The question for this list is this: when did the new swap file format take
> effect? My man page for mkswap is dated 25 March 1999, and is associated
> with Linux kernel 2.2.4. That is a good six months before the article was
> posted. Did the new swap file format take place even before that date? If
> so, when?
>
> I am not concerned with whther this is a deliberate lie or not. The error
> casts grave suspicion on MS' Linux position papers regardless. My question
> is, should the author of the article have known better? The older the
> changeover to the new swap file format, the better the case for negligence
> on the part of Microsoft's anoymous author.
>
> --
>
> -- C^2
>
> No windows were crashed in the making of this email.
>
> Looking for fine software and/or web pages?
> http://w3.trib.com/~ccurley
I don't know when the change occured, but I do remember my first linux
install (RedHat 5.2) imposing the 128Mb (although I recall it as 127Mb) swap
file size restriction.
Trevor
