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From: James Harris <james.harris.1@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: Linux doesn't seem to manage memory very well
Date: Thu, 2 May 2024 14:54:30 +0100
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On 01/05/2024 15:06, David W. Hodgins wrote:
> On Wed, 01 May 2024 06:32:18 -0400, James Harris 
> <james.harris.1@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Not a question, just an observation.
>> I say that Linux doesn't seem to handle memory well because my laptop
>> had 8GB RAM (which, frankly, Windows seems to find perfectly adequate
>> for a similar workload). Under Linux the RAM would fill up and then swap
>> space would be used. Then the machine would become largely unresponsive
>> - e.g. taking minutes to switch between windows.
>> So I upgraded the RAM. It now has three times as much (i.e. 24GB)! But
>> even so, RAM has still steadily filled up until reaching the full 24GB.
>> What's more, it's now showing 4.8GB of swap space in use.
> 
> Likely you're using a system that's configured for maximum total 
> throughput,
> not best response time.
> 
> Create a file, /etc/sysctl.d/tales.conf with the contents ...
> # Reduce applications being swapped
> vm.swappiness=1
> # Don't shrink the inode cache
> vm.vfs_cache_pressure=50
> 
> Then run the command "sysctl --system" (as root).
> 
> See 
> https://rudd-o.com/linux-and-free-software/tales-from-responsivenessland-why-linux-feels-slow-and-how-to-fix-that
> for an explanation.

I very much like the control that Linux gives to a user but ISTM that 
what you say here is a great example of the issue I was pointing out in 
the original post: IMO page depletion should be handled better *by 
default* and not need human intervention for normal scenarios.


-- 
James Harris