linux-kernel - tracking memory usage/leak in "inactive" field in /proc/meminfo?

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Date:	Tue, 09 Feb 2010 10:51:09 -0600
From:	"Chris Friesen" <cfriesen@...tel.com>
To:	Rik van Riel <riel@...hat.com>,
	Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
	linux-mm@...ck.org
Subject: tracking memory usage/leak in "inactive" field in /proc/meminfo?

Hi,

I'm hoping you can help me out.  I'm on a 2.6.27 x86 system and I'm
seeing the "inactive" field in /proc/meminfo slowly growing over time to
the point where eventually the oom-killer kicks in and starts killing
things.  The growth is not evident in any other field in /proc/meminfo.

I'm trying to figure out where the memory is going, and what it's being
used for.

As I've found, the fields in /proc/meminfo don't add up...in particular,
active+inactive is quite a bit larger than
buffers+cached+dirty+anonpages+mapped+pagetables+vmallocused.  Initially
the difference is about 156MB, but after about 13 hrs the difference is
240MB.

How can I track down where this is going?  Can you suggest any
instrumentation that I can add?

I'm reasonably capable, but I'm getting seriously confused trying to
sort out the memory subsystem.  Some pointers would be appreciated.

Thanks,

Chris
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