Slab: in /proc/meminfo not corrent in recent kernels?

[Dave Jones]

On Thu, Feb 03, 2005 at 11:07:53PM -0700, Wes Shull wrote:
 > Since sometime after build 1176 (IIRC), I've noticed that the KDE
 > System Monitor tray applet (/usr/lib/kde3/ktimemon_panelapplet.*) has
 > been reporting unbelievable amounts of memory used by the kernel.
 > 
 > I finally got around to taking a gander at the source to figure it
 > out...  in KSample::readSample() in
 > kdeaddons-3.3.2/kicker-applets/ktimemon/sample.cc, it adds the Slab: 
 > line (if it exists) to the Buffers: line to estimate kernel memory
 > usage.  Seems reasonable to me.  So I compared those values as
 > reported by two different kernels.
 > 
 > Under 741 (current FC3 update), meminfo says:
 > Buffers:         21676 kB
 > Slab:            24252 kB
 > 
 > Which I can believe.  But under not too different usage, 1124 (latest
 > rawhide) reports:
 > Buffers:          8052 kB
 > Slab:           116104 kB
 > 
 > Which seems crazy (this is a 256 MB machine).
 > 
 > So, has the meaning of the Slab: line changed, such that I need to
 > bugzilla this for kdeaddons, or do I need to report this against the
 > kernel?

It depends. You just might have completely different things in
slab cache.  if you cat /proc/slabinfo (or run slabtop) you should
see which slab has had the most growth between the two kernels.

		Dave