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Linux 2.2 and 2.4 VM Systems Compared

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the hey-look-someone-did-actual-tests dept.

Derek Glidden writes "I got sick of trying to figure out from other people's reports whether or not the 2.4 kernel VM system was broken or not, so I decided to run my own tests, write them up and post them online. The short conclusion is that the 2.4 VM rocks when compared with 2.2, but there's more to it than just that."

4 of 225 comments (clear)

  1. Somebody help me out here by rho · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Quite often I get the feeling that Linux and BSD are doing quite a bit of "me-too"-isms in an attempt to catch up with the mainstream OSes--including MS, Apple and commercial Unixen.

    I read this story and wonder if I should still be getting the same feeling -- isn't a VM subsystem mostly a solved problem? Or am I reading this wrong, and this is merely tweaking and specialization?

    Since I'm no Alan Cox (I'm closer to Alan Thicke), I can't see the truth of the matter, but I get the feeling that we're doing a lot of walking in a tight circle on the path, while others have already left the forest.

    --
    Potato chips are a by-yourself food.
    1. Re:Somebody help me out here by Ami+Ganguli · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Another factor is probably the tremendous range of hardware and workloads that Linux tries to handle. I don't think any other OS attempts to work well on watches and mainframes (and everything inbetween) while using the same code base.

      --
      It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail. - Abraham Maslow
  2. This is all well and good by duffbeer703 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    But the fact remains is that this VM holy war should have been resolved in the 2.3 series of kernels.

    The number of major problems and architectural changes that are being made to the supposedly 'stable' branch of Linux kernel is really run amok.

    I'm sure there's plenty of outrages to come as bad bugs are found in the volume manager and other new elements of 2.4

    --
    Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
  3. Check out Linux Weekly News and Kernel Traffic by cpeterso · · Score: 5, Interesting

    (Yes, I spend an hour a day reading the kernel mailing list.)

    I'm too lazy to read LKML, but I am interested in the happenings of the Linux kernel development. I highly recommend Linux Weekly News' kernel news (updated every Thursday) and Kernel Traffic , an in depth summary of the week's LKML happenings (usually updated every Sunday or Monday).

    --
    cpeterso