On Tue, 21 Mar 2006, Jim C. Nasby wrote:
> On Tue, Mar 21, 2006 at 11:03:26PM +1200, Mark Kirkwood wrote:
> >
> > So its really all about accounting, in a sense - whether pages end up in
> > the 'Buf' or 'Inactive' queue, they are still cached!
>
> So what's the difference between Buf and Active then? Just that active
> means it's a code page, or that it's been directly mapped into a
> processes memory (perhaps via mmap)?
I don't think that Buf and Active are mutually exclusive. Try adding up
Active, Inactive, Cache, Wired, Buf and Free - it'll come to more than
your physical memory.
Active gives an amount of physical memory. Buf gives an amount of
kernel-space virtual memory which provide the kernel with a window on to
pages in the other categories. In fact, I don't think that 'Buf' really
belongs in the list as it doesn't represent a 'type' of page at all.
--
Alex Hayward
Seatbooker
