Re: [PATCH] add extra free kbytes tunable

[Simon Jeons <simon.jeons@gmail.com>]

Hi Hugh,
On 03/02/2013 11:08 AM, Hugh Dickins wrote:
> On Sat, 2 Mar 2013, Simon Jeons wrote:
>> On 03/02/2013 09:42 AM, Hugh Dickins wrote:
>>> On Sat, 2 Mar 2013, Simon Jeons wrote:
>>>> In function __add_to_swap_cache if add to radix tree successfully will
>>>> result
>>>> in increase NR_FILE_PAGES, why? This is anonymous page instead of file
>>>> backed
>>>> page.
>>> Right, that's hard to understand without historical background.
>>>
>>> I think the quick answer would be that we used to (and still do) think
>>> of file-cache and swap-cache as two halves of page-cache.  And then when
>> shmem page should be treated as file-cache or swap-cache? It is strange since
>> it is consist of anonymous pages and these pages establish files.
> A shmem page is swap-backed file-cache, and it may get transferred to or
> from swap-cache: yes, it's a difficult and confusing case, as I said below.
>
> I would never call it "anonymous", but it is counted in /proc/meminfo's
> Active(anon) or Inactive(anon) rather than in (file), because "anon"
> there is shorthand for "swap-backed".

In read_swap_cache_async:

SetPageSwapBacked(new_page);
__add_to_swap_cache();
swap_readpage();
ClearPageSwapBacked(new_page);

Why clear PG_swapbacked flag?

>
>>> So you'll find that shmem and swap are counted as file in some places
>>> and anon in others, and it's hard to grasp which is where and why,
>>> without remembering the history.
> Hugh

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