linux-kernel - Re: Linux 2.6.31 - very swap-happy with plenty of free RAM

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Date:	Wed, 18 Nov 2009 10:22:43 -0500
From:	Rik van Riel <riel@...hat.com>
To:	Dan Merillat <dan.merillat@...il.com>
CC:	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: Linux 2.6.31 - very swap-happy with plenty of free RAM

On 11/18/2009 02:56 AM, Dan Merillat wrote:
> 1.7gb of disk cache, 750 meg of free RAM, and it swaps out 300meg in a
> matter of seconds when given access to a swapfile, then thrashes the
> disk like crazy because that RAM was actively in use.
>    

> Ideas on where to start looking?  If this is a vmware issue I'll take
> it to them.
>    
This smells like a higher order memory allocation
failed and either is doing a lot of direct reclaim or
kicked kswapd until it freed up lots of memory.

However, I do not believe we keep track of higher
order reclaims in /proc/vmstat or elsewhere I
looked :(
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