From owner-freebsd-hackers Wed Jul 8 21:16:15 1998 Return-Path: Received: (from majordom@localhost) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) id VAA21452 for freebsd-hackers-outgoing; Wed, 8 Jul 1998 21:16:15 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG) Received: from mail.HiWAAY.net (fly.HiWAAY.net [208.147.154.56]) by hub.freebsd.org (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id VAA21444 for ; Wed, 8 Jul 1998 21:16:13 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from dkelly@n4hhe.ampr.org) Received: from nospam.hiwaay.net (tnt4-180.HiWAAY.net [208.166.127.180]) by mail.HiWAAY.net (8.9.0/8.9.0) with ESMTP id XAA26839; Wed, 8 Jul 1998 23:16:10 -0500 (CDT) Received: from n4hhe.ampr.org (localhost.ampr.org [127.0.0.1]) by nospam.hiwaay.net (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id RAA02989; Wed, 8 Jul 1998 17:59:51 -0500 (CDT) (envelope-from dkelly@n4hhe.ampr.org) Message-Id: <199807082259.RAA02989@nospam.hiwaay.net> X-Mailer: exmh version 2.0.2 2/24/98 To: Stefan Eggers cc: freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG, David Kelly From: David Kelly Subject: Re: Someone working on swapoff? In-reply-to: Message from Stefan Eggers of "Wed, 08 Jul 1998 08:31:38 +0200." <199807080631.IAA01081@semyam.dinoco.de> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Date: Wed, 08 Jul 1998 17:59:51 -0500 Sender: owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG Stefan Eggers writes: > > system, but would it be breaking sacred tradition to merge swapon and > > the future swapoff into one "swap" management utility? The unified > > utility could do swapon tasks if linked to the name "swapon" and > > swapoff tasks if its named "swapoff". > > I think deciding on the name how to behave is not that good an idea > in the first place. Besides this: How long would the swapoff in user > land be? About 50 lines or less I'd guess. Merging is not worth > any effort as it does save nothing in C code lines but adds more code > to do the check the program name and call the corresponding code. > > What would then be worth talking about is replacing swapon with a new > command for swap management. But that can wait till there is any need > for this i.e. the kernel support for swapoff or priorities or something > like that is at least nearly finished! For that such a merger might be > worthwhile as the swapon functionalty would be in the new command > already and one would have to support swapon for compatibility at least > for a while. That's like pstat and swapinfo. That's the other one to merge into swap(1), swapinfo/pstat(1). Agree that its too early to decide on a name, the functionality is needed first. But didn't think it was too early to start thinking about the name. But mostly I'm thinking about how it gets used. Bouncing between SGI Irix, Sun Solaris, and FreeBSD, swap, swapon, and swapinfo are commands residing in the cobweb corners of my brain as they are generally not used until there is a problem. Often the wrong one comes to the top when needed, resulting in a session of, "man -k swap", hunting for the right one. In the advent of a functioning swapoff, we should consider bringing the highest level of swap management into conformity with the other Un*x's. pstat is moderatly complex: n4hhe: {801} wc -l /usr/src/usr.sbin/pstat/pstat.c 1191 /usr/src/usr.sbin/pstat/pstat.c n4hhe: {802} -- David Kelly N4HHE, dkelly@nospam.hiwaay.net ===================================================================== The human mind ordinarily operates at only ten percent of its capacity -- the rest is overhead for the operating system. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message