> You are indeed missing something--look at the amount used for buffers and
> cache. This can be freed by the system when a program issues a malloc()
> call. It can be grabbed again from the free memory pool when the program
> releases it and turned to the same purpose, making your machine run faster.
Yes.. agreed.. I know it.. but look at this :
> > [root@vv17 /root]# free
> > total used free shared buffers cached
> > Mem: 899952 556784 343168 0 170032 265936
> > -/+ buffers/cache: 120816 779136
> > Swap: 1791208 118408 1672800
> > [root@vv17 /root]#
This is how I interpret it :
total used = 556MB
buffers = 170MB
cached = 256MB
therefore, buff+chached 426MB
so after removing buff and cached we get = 556 - 426 = 130MB
i.e the current processes are using 130MB. Now I don't have anything running
on the machine right now.. so whatever memory was used by older processes
should now be part of buffer and cache right? Then where does this extra
memory usage come from?
When I reboot the machine, the usaage is just 35MB
>
> In Windows, you are taught to reboot when your resource meter drops. In
> linux, unused memory is considered WASTED memory. The system, the kernel,
> WILL employ it for something beneficial if at all possible.
I know this and I am not comparing with windows.. Let me tell you that I have
never ever seriously used windows.. played with it a little bit when 95 came
out, but coding was mostly in dos in those days.. then IRIX and for the past
1&1/2 years, full time linux :)
I am keeping the rest of the mail for reference.
thanks!
sarang
>
> > 3:31pm up 5 days, 2:09, 2 users, load average: 0.00, 0.00, 0.00
> > 54 processes: 53 sleeping, 1 running, 0 zombie, 0 stopped
> > CPU0 states: 0.0% user, 0.1% system, 0.0% nice, 99.4% idle
> > CPU1 states: 0.0% user, 0.0% system, 0.0% nice, 100.0% idle
> > Mem: 899952K av, 556948K used, 343004K free, 0K shrd, 170032K
> > buff Swap: 1791208K av, 118408K used, 1672800K free
> > 265936K cached
> >
> > PID USER PRI NI SIZE RSS SHARE STAT %CPU %MEM TIME COMMAND
> > 1081 squid 14 0 3952 2724 2076 S 0.0 0.3 2:37 squid
> > 13363 root 9 0 1692 1588 1312 S 0.0 0.1 0:00 sshd
> > 13366 root 15 0 1584 1584 1156 S 0.0 0.1 0:00 bash
> > 13403 root 19 0 1204 1204 972 R 0.1 0.1 0:00 top
> > 13354 postfix 9 0 804 804 684 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 pickup
> > 11206 sarang 8 0 1084 528 528 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 csh
> > 1154 root 9 0 2512 460 228 S 0.0 0.0 0:03 miniserv.pl
> > 1005 postfix 9 0 488 416 416 S 0.0 0.0 0:01 qmgr
> > 821 root 9 0 376 316 316 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 rpc.mountd
> > 636 rpc 9 0 264 240 240 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 portmap
> > 11204 root 9 0 564 216 216 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 sshd
> > 763 root 9 0 368 180 156 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 sshd
> > 648 root 9 0 232 176 176 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 syslogd
> > 1079 mysql 9 0 2736 164 16 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 mysqld
> > 1134 mysql 9 0 2736 164 16 S 0.0 0.0 0:01 mysqld
> > 1135 mysql 9 0 2736 164 16 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 mysqld
> > 1153 mysql 9 0 2736 164 16 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 mysqld
> > 11508 sarang 9 0 348 132 132 S 0.0 0.0 0:06 xosview
> > 686 root 9 0 184 128 128 S 0.0 0.0 0:01 ypbind
> > 1001 root 9 0 208 124 96 S 0.0 0.0 0:01 master
> > 1036 root 10 0 172 112 96 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 crond
> > 1 root 9 0 120 76 76 S 0.0 0.0 0:07 init
> > 1108 xfs 9 0 2128 52 52 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 xfs
> > 782 root 9 0 200 20 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 xinetd
> > 1047 root 9 0 184 8 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 safe_mysqld
> > 657 root 9 0 632 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 klogd
> > 672 rpcuser 9 0 116 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 rpc.statd
> > 685 root 9 0 84 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 ypbind
> > 812 root 9 0 72 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 rpc.rquotad
> > 1080 root 9 0 188 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 squid
> > 1173 root 9 0 64 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 mingetty
> > 1174 root 9 0 64 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 mingetty
> > 1175 root 9 0 64 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 mingetty
> > 1176 root 9 0 64 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 mingetty
> > 1177 root 9 0 64 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 mingetty
> > 1178 root 9 0 64 4 4 S 0.0 0.0 0:00 mingetty
> > 2 root 8 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 keventd
> > 3 root 9 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:25 kswapd
> > 4 root 9 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:00 kreclaimd
> > 5 root 9 0 0 0 0 SW 0.0 0.0 0:03 bdflush
> >
> >
> >
> > [root@vv17 /root]# free
> > total used free shared buffers cached
> > Mem: 899952 556784 343168 0 170032 265936
> > -/+ buffers/cache: 120816 779136
> > Swap: 1791208 118408 1672800
> > [root@vv17 /root]#
> >
> > [root@vx17 /root]# cat /proc/meminfo
> > total: used: free: shared: buffers: cached:
> > Mem: 921550848 570155008 351395840 0 174112768 272318464
> > Swap: 1834196992 121249792 1712947200
> > MemTotal: 899952 kB
> > MemFree: 343160 kB
> > MemShared: 0 kB
> > Buffers: 170032 kB
> > Cached: 265936 kB
> > Active: 7248 kB
> > Inact_dirty: 426376 kB
> > Inact_clean: 2344 kB
> > Inact_target: 4 kB
> > HighTotal: 0 kB
> > HighFree: 0 kB
> > LowTotal: 899952 kB
> > LowFree: 343160 kB
> > SwapTotal: 1791208 kB
> > SwapFree: 1672800 kB
> >
> > ---------------------------------------------
> > Sarang Lakare
> >
> > http://www.cs.sunysb.edu/~lsarang
> > http://www.linux.org
--
---------------------------------------------
Sarang Lakare
http://www.cs.sunysb.edu/~lsarang
http://www.linux.org
