Re: System performance using swap partition vs. swap file

[Mark Knecht <markknecht attbi com>]

Rick,
   You made my Linux day to think that I might have provided a good idea
back to you after all of your work here! <broad smile> Unfortunately, it
wasn't my idea personally, but I don't mind being the messenger.

   My current swap partition is a 1GB partition, so I shouldn't have any
problems with size. The machine currently has 256MB in it, but I might
go to 512MB one of these days, so I chose 1GB to get ready for that.

   I don't understand the use for multiple swap partitions, but I'm
guessing it's either a server or SMP issue? Possibly really large memory
machines, say 4GB or DRAM, need 8GB or swap, so you have to break it
into pieces?

   Anyway, I'll have to see if any of my books cover making and
installing swap files.

   I can't see the need for ext3 on a swap file.I know you didn't really
suggest it, but the possibility crept in the way you responded.

Thanks,
Mark

On Mon, 2002-12-09 at 15:21, Rick Stevens wrote:
> Mark Knecht wrote:
> > Rick,
> >    This goes back to the problem that I was having with the kernel that
> > ordered the disk controllers differently. If you remember, in one case it
> > said HDA and in the other case it said HDE.
> > 
> >    For my data partitions I got around the problem by not mounting devices,
> > like /dev/hda7 or /dev/hde7, but instead using an ext2 label, and then
> > mounting a label in fstab instead. It works very nicely.
> > 
> >    However, it doesn't work for swap partitions, as far as I know...
> 
> Er, no, it won't.  The labels are part of the ext2/3 filesystem, and
> swap doesn't have it.
> 
> >    My idea was to make a new ext2 partition, label it as /swap_part and then
> > mount that in fstab using levels also. The only thing that I'll have on that
> > partition will be the swap file, so there shouldn't be any issues WRT the
> > file system doing weird things. Any access to that partition I intend to be
> > to the swap file.
> 
> Ah!  Yes, that would work.  Sneaky and clever, Mark!  An ext2
> partition labeled "swap" and split up into multiple swap files.  VERY
> nice!
> 
> Keep in mind that swap files and partitions can be no larger than 2GB,
> so you may need more than one.
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> - Rick Stevens, Senior Systems Engineer     rstevens vitalstream com -
> - VitalStream, Inc.                       http://www.vitalstream.com -
> -                                                                    -
> -         Okay, who put a "stop payment" on my reality check?        -
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
> 
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