WARNING - OLD ARCHIVES

This is an archived copy of the Xen.org mailing list, which we have preserved to ensure that existing links to archives are not broken. The live archive, which contains the latest emails, can be found at http://lists.xen.org/
   
 
 
Xen 
 
Home Products Support Community News
 
   
 

xen-users

Re: [Xen-devel] Re: [Xen-users] Max. PV and HVM Guests

To: Keir Fraser <keir.fraser@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [Xen-devel] Re: [Xen-users] Max. PV and HVM Guests
From: Pasi Kärkkäinen <pasik@xxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 2009 17:27:42 +0200
Cc: Robert Dunkley <Robert@xxxxxxxxx>, "xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" <xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, "Mr. Teo En Ming \(Zhang Enming\)" <space.time.universe@xxxxxxxxx>, "xen-users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" <xen-users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Nick Couchman <Nick.Couchman@xxxxxxxxx>
Delivery-date: Mon, 09 Nov 2009 07:28:38 -0800
Envelope-to: www-data@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
In-reply-to: <C71DE4CB.199C4%keir.fraser@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
List-help: <mailto:xen-devel-request@lists.xensource.com?subject=help>
List-id: Xen developer discussion <xen-devel.lists.xensource.com>
List-post: <mailto:xen-devel@lists.xensource.com>
List-subscribe: <http://lists.xensource.com/mailman/listinfo/xen-devel>, <mailto:xen-devel-request@lists.xensource.com?subject=subscribe>
List-unsubscribe: <http://lists.xensource.com/mailman/listinfo/xen-devel>, <mailto:xen-devel-request@lists.xensource.com?subject=unsubscribe>
References: <20091109151750.GN16033@xxxxxxxxxxx> <C71DE4CB.199C4%keir.fraser@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sender: xen-devel-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
User-agent: Mutt/1.5.13 (2006-08-11)
On Mon, Nov 09, 2009 at 03:24:59PM +0000, Keir Fraser wrote:
> On 09/11/2009 15:17, "Pasi Kärkkäinen" <pasik@xxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> >> Furthermore, while I'm not
> >> Linux developer and so not familiar with how Linux calculates buffering
> >> and caching, I do know that my Linux systems dynamically manage buffers
> >> and caches, and when memory is reduced or some application requires a
> >> larger amount of physical memory, Linux reduces the amount of data in
> >> buffers and caches.
> >> 
> > 
> > Yeah, it has to do with sizing the network buffers, caches etc..
> > 
> > It shouldn't _crash_, so Teo is seeing some bug I believe. But it has
> > always been "best practice" to limit dom0 memory - and prevent weird
> > things happening later (like "memory squeeze in netback driver").
> 
> The issue is not really kernel data like network buffers and buffer cache.
> It is kernel memory metadata -- primarily the per-page info structure that
> the kernel maintains. The metadata doesn't get shrunk with memory size when
> ballooning out, hence it increases as a proportion of memory still assigned
> to the domain. That really is significant when aggressively ballooning down
> a large-memory domain.
> 

Ok, thanks. That makes sense. 

-- Pasi


_______________________________________________
Xen-devel mailing list
Xen-devel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://lists.xensource.com/xen-devel