out of swap space??

[Conor P. Cahill]

terry at jgaltstl.UUCP (terry linhardt) writes:

>I've often wondered where the recommendation that 2 - 3x real memory should
>be made available to swap comes from? Wouldn't this depend upon
>whether or not the system is swapping at all? For instance, let's
>say you have 48 meg of memory, and no swapping. Does this mean
>I should tie up 100 - 150 meg of disk space for swap? Also, isn't
>there less need for swap space with paging systems?

100MB of disk sounds like a lot to waste, but in a system with 48MB you
are probably going to have something like 1 or 2 GB, so 100MB looks
much smaller in that context.

You do not want to run out of swap space.  If that means you over-configure
a bit, so be it.

>I would like to see some thoughts on the validity of these
>rule-of-thumb recommendations. Not saying they are wrong, but would
>like to know the justification behind them.

And I'm not saying they are right.  However, with those rules of thumb and
some guessing as to the intended load, I have never had a system that I 
configured run out of swap.  It's a small price to pay for some real sanity.

-- 
Conor P. Cahill            (703)430-9247        Virtual Technologies, Inc.
uunet!virtech!cpcahil                           46030 Manekin Plaza, Suite 160
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