Installing and Using Applications
Memory Usage and Swap Space
13-8
SPARCbook Portable Workstation User Guide
Memory Usage and Swap Space
The Solaris operating system uses virtual memory to allow several
applications to run simultaneously when they would otherwise require
more memory than is physically present in the system. To support this
feature, one of the disk partitions on the boot disk is assigned to provide
your SPARCbook with ‘swap space’. This allows parts of programs that
are not running at any given moment to be stored (or swapped)
temporarily on to the hard disk while active applications are running in
main memory. The effect of this is to make your SPARCbook’s
memory appear to be much larger than it really is.
The
swap
partition created by the “factory install” on your
SPARCbook’s removable hard disk drive is large enough to allow a
reasonable number of tools and applications to be used simultaneously.
Table 13-1 shows the sizes used for the
swap
partition for the different
memory capacities. See also “Boot Disk Partitions” on page 6-5.
Using swap space efficiently
All applications require a certain amount of memory to be available
before they will start up. Your SPARCbook’s memory can soon be used
up if you start up many applications and leave them all running on the
OpenWindows or CDE workspace. Typically, if you are running one or
two applications together with a Mail Tool, a clock and a File Manager
Memory (MB)
swap size (MB)
16
32
32
64
64
96
128
128
256
256
Table 13-1 Factory Configured Swap Partition Sizes
S3UG4_Book Page 8 Friday, August 8, 1997 11:37 am
