From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: by py-out-1112.google.com with SMTP id f31so564461pyh for ; Wed, 25 Jul 2007 05:39:19 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: <5c77e14b0707250539q167a8922y22e26ac7a757c329@mail.gmail.com> Date: Wed, 25 Jul 2007 14:39:19 +0200 From: "Jos Poortvliet" Subject: Re: [ck] Re: -mm merge plans for 2.6.23 In-Reply-To: <46A72EC9.4030706@yahoo.com.au> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----=_Part_121633_10083849.1185367159136" References: <46A57068.3070701@yahoo.com.au> <46A6D7D2.4050708@gmail.com> <46A6DFFD.9030202@gmail.com> <30701.1185347660@turing-police.cc.vt.edu> <46A7074B.50608@gmail.com> <20070725082822.GA13098@elte.hu> <46A70D37.3060005@gmail.com> <5c77e14b0707250353r48458316x5e6adde6dbce1fbd@mail.gmail.com> <46A72EC9.4030706@yahoo.com.au> Sender: owner-linux-mm@kvack.org Return-Path: To: Nick Piggin Cc: Rene Herman , Ingo Molnar , david@lang.hm, Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu, Ray Lee , Jesper Juhl , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, ck list , linux-mm@kvack.org, Paul Jackson , Andrew Morton List-ID: ------=_Part_121633_10083849.1185367159136 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline Please ignore my mail... It was uninformed and not constructive. I should've reread it and thought about it more. Sorry. On 7/25/07, Nick Piggin wrote: > > Jos Poortvliet wrote: > > > Nick > > has been talking about 'fixing the updatedb thing' for years now, no > patch > > yet. > > Wrong Nick, I think. > > First I heard about the updatedb problem was a few months ago with people > saying updatedb was causing their system to swap (that is, swap > prefetching > helped after updatedb). I haven't been able to even try to fix it because > I > can't reproduce it (I'm sitting on a machine with 256MB RAM), and nobody > has wanted to help me. > > > > Besides, he won't fix OO.o nor all other userspace stuff - so > > actually, > > he does NOT even promise an alternative. Not that I think fixing > updatedb > > would be cool, btw - it sure would, but it's no reason not to include > swap > > prefetch - it's mostly unrelated. > > > > I think everyone with >1 gb ram should stop saying 'I don't need it' > > because > > that's obvious for that hardware. Just like ppl having a dual- or > quadcore > > shouldn't even talk about scheduler interactivity stuff... > > Actually there are people with >1GB of ram who are saying it helps. Why do > you want to shut people out of the discussion? > > > > Desktop users want it, tests show it works, there is no alternative and > the > > maybe-promised-one won't even fix all cornercases. It's small, mostly > > selfcontained. There is a maintainer. It's been stable for a long time. > > It's > > been in MM for a long time. > > > > Yet it doesn't make it. Andrew says 'some ppl have objections' (he means > > Nick) and he doesn't see an advantage in it (at least 4 gig ram, right, > > Andrew?). > > > > Do I miss things? > > You could try constructively contributing? > > > > Apparently, it didn't get in yet - and I find it hard to believe Andrew > > holds swapprefetch for reasons like the above. So it must be something > > else. > > > > > > Nick is saying tests have already proven swap prefetch to be helpfull, > > that's not the problem. He calls the requirements to get in 'fuzzy'. OK. > > The test I have seen is the one that forces a huge amount of memory to > swap out, waits, then touches it. That speeds up, and that's fine. That's > a good sanity test to ensure it is working. Beyond that there are other > considerations to getting something merged. > > -- > SUSE Labs, Novell Inc. > ------=_Part_121633_10083849.1185367159136 Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline Please ignore my mail... It was uninformed and not constructive. I should've reread it and thought about it more. Sorry.

On 7/25/07, Nick Piggin < nickpiggin@yahoo.com.au> wrote:
Jos Poortvliet wrote:

> Nick
> has been talking about 'fixing the updatedb thing' for years now, no patch
> yet.

Wrong Nick, I think.

First I heard about the updatedb problem was a few months ago with people
saying updatedb was causing their system to swap (that is, swap prefetching
helped after updatedb). I haven't been able to even try to fix it because I
can't reproduce it (I'm sitting on a machine with 256MB RAM), and nobody
has wanted to help me.


> Besides, he won't fix OO.o nor all other userspace stuff - so
> actually,
> he does NOT even promise an alternative. Not that I think fixing updatedb
> would be cool, btw - it sure would, but it's no reason not to include swap
> prefetch - it's mostly unrelated.
>
> I think everyone with >1 gb ram should stop saying 'I don't need it'
> because
> that's obvious for that hardware. Just like ppl having a dual- or quadcore
> shouldn't even talk about scheduler interactivity stuff...

Actually there are people with >1GB of ram who are saying it helps. Why do
you want to shut people out of the discussion?


> Desktop users want it, tests show it works, there is no alternative and the
> maybe-promised-one won't even fix all cornercases. It's small, mostly
> selfcontained. There is a maintainer. It's been stable for a long time.
> It's
> been in MM for a long time.
>
> Yet it doesn't make it. Andrew says 'some ppl have objections' (he means
> Nick) and he doesn't see an advantage in it (at least 4 gig ram, right,
> Andrew?).
>
> Do I miss things?

You could try constructively contributing?


> Apparently, it didn't get in yet - and I find it hard to believe Andrew
> holds swapprefetch for reasons like the above. So it must be something
> else.
>
>
> Nick is saying tests have already proven swap prefetch to be helpfull,
> that's not the problem. He calls the requirements to get in 'fuzzy'. OK.

The test I have seen is the one that forces a huge amount of memory to
swap out, waits, then touches it. That speeds up, and that's fine. That's
a good sanity test to ensure it is working. Beyond that there are other
considerations to getting something merged.

--
SUSE Labs, Novell Inc.

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