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From: Lowell Gilbert <freebsd-questions-local@be-well.ilk.org>
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Cc: FreeBSD questions <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>
Subject: Re: Where is the memory
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<scuba@centroin.com.br> writes:

> On Tue, 5 Jul 2005, Chuck Swiger wrote:
>=20
> |scuba@centroin.com.br wrote:
> |[ ... ]
> |> 	My problem is that I think something in the system is allocating
> |> memory and not releasing it.
> |
> |The kernel will attempt to use all but a little RAM reserved as free spa=
ce to
> |cache stuff from disk, unless and until that memory is needed for someth=
ing else.
>=20
> 	It seems that this is the case. I wrote a small program to
> allocate a large block of memory (more them that shown as free) and the
> system doesn=B4t swap.

That isn't relevant.  The memory won't even be mapped in until it is
accessed.=20=20

> 	That is the memory top shows as "Inactive"?

I don't understand the question.  I suspect you are looking for the
following bit of the FreeBSD documentation:
http://www.br.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/misc.html#TOP-FREEM=
EM