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Hi I'm the author, and I find it surprising that this has received 60 upvotes, but 0 comments. I had fun creating this, and might make similar visualizations i

Hi I'm the author, and I find it surprising that this has received 60 upvotes, but 0 comments. I had fun creating this, and might make similar visualizations in the future. If you have feedback or requests, I would welcome it. I give you permission to disregard HN's policy on 'gratuitous negativity' as much as I have the authority to.

jamesmiller5 11y ago
I believe it's the opposite of bike shedding, this is a very technical topic and is well written, there is little to debate :) . Thank you for writing it, I'm actually doing a little refresher of my computer architecture coursework now and comparing what I remember to article. Virtual Memory Explanation - https://www.cs.purdue.edu/homes/clifton/cs250/ https://www.cs.purdue.edu/homes/clifton/cs250/ Virtual Memory Exercise - http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:VFdxPaP13S0J:https://www.cs.purdue.edu/homes/cs503/lab5/lab5.html+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:VFdxPaP...
havko 11y ago
I am just staring at it with my mouth open wishing I understood it haha. I will have to consume this in smaller bites.
kevhito 11y ago
Well, I looked at it and bookmarked it for possible use in my upcoming semester when we cover virtual memory. I'll have to go through it in a bit more detail and don't have the time now. But if you want feedback, my only comment after playing with it for 15 minutes is that I wish the animation could be controlled. Or at least paused. The "run animation" doesn't seem to do anything for me. Otherwise, I really like the idea and the visualization. I like the 256 byte idea too.
MicroBerto 11y ago
Not a bad day when you literally outsmart the entirety of Hacker News
jacquesm 11y ago
> Hi I'm the author, and I find it surprising that this has received 60 upvotes, but 0 comments. As one of those 'silent upvoters' and just speaking for myself, think of it as 'speechless'. I wrote a pretty basic kernel which used memory mapping but without virtual memory. Explaining those concepts to someone else is pretty hard and your live animation would have simplified quite a few discussions I've had on the subject if I had had access to it the better part of 2 decades ago. So thank you very much for this work, consider applying similar techniques to visualizing what happens to a running program as it allocates memory and frees it again for various parts of the programs life-span.
carapace 11y ago
It's a fantastic article. You've done a service. I think that's why it's received few comments. One nit though: the low-contrast font color makes it unnecessarily hard to read.
xigency 11y ago
Very good visualization and explanation. Pretty fantastic.
ingenter 11y ago
I must say that I find the lines confusing. I don't understand what they mean. I think it would be nice to have a complete memory lookup written down step by step in text form. e.g. we're trying to look up the address 0xAA in virtual memory, the current page table pointer is 0xBB, therefore we're reading directory entry from the address 0xCC the directory address contains (...) etc.
kenOfYugen 11y ago
Mindblown! So much concentrated information and so nicely presented! Would like to see more low-level stuff that makes sense.
benwills 11y ago
Not sure if others are having the same experience with it, but I'm finding it just beyond my comprehension, in the best way possible. So I'm not sure how I'd comment on it. And what I mean by 'just beyond my comprehension' is that it's far enough ahead (and also in the direction I'm headed), that I'll be reading it several times before it all really sinks in. In short, I love it. I think this is really fantastic and I wish more folks took the time you did to really walk through more intricate concepts like this. Really, really appreciate the time you put in. Thank you.

jamesmiller5 11y ago

I believe it's the opposite of bike shedding, this is a very technical topic and is well written, there is little to debate :) . Thank you for writing it, I'm actually doing a little refresher of my computer architecture coursework now and comparing what I remember to article. Virtual Memory Explanation - https://www.cs.purdue.edu/homes/clifton/cs250/ https://www.cs.purdue.edu/homes/clifton/cs250/ Virtual Memory Exercise - http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:VFdxPaP13S0J:https://www.cs.purdue.edu/homes/cs503/lab5/lab5.html+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:VFdxPaP...

havko 11y ago

I am just staring at it with my mouth open wishing I understood it haha. I will have to consume this in smaller bites.

kevhito 11y ago

Well, I looked at it and bookmarked it for possible use in my upcoming semester when we cover virtual memory. I'll have to go through it in a bit more detail and don't have the time now. But if you want feedback, my only comment after playing with it for 15 minutes is that I wish the animation could be controlled. Or at least paused. The "run animation" doesn't seem to do anything for me. Otherwise, I really like the idea and the visualization. I like the 256 byte idea too.

MicroBerto 11y ago

Not a bad day when you literally outsmart the entirety of Hacker News

jacquesm 11y ago

> Hi I'm the author, and I find it surprising that this has received 60 upvotes, but 0 comments. As one of those 'silent upvoters' and just speaking for myself, think of it as 'speechless'. I wrote a pretty basic kernel which used memory mapping but without virtual memory. Explaining those concepts to someone else is pretty hard and your live animation would have simplified quite a few discussions I've had on the subject if I had had access to it the better part of 2 decades ago. So thank you very much for this work, consider applying similar techniques to visualizing what happens to a running program as it allocates memory and frees it again for various parts of the programs life-span.

carapace 11y ago

It's a fantastic article. You've done a service. I think that's why it's received few comments. One nit though: the low-contrast font color makes it unnecessarily hard to read.

xigency 11y ago

Very good visualization and explanation. Pretty fantastic.

ingenter 11y ago

I must say that I find the lines confusing. I don't understand what they mean. I think it would be nice to have a complete memory lookup written down step by step in text form. e.g. we're trying to look up the address 0xAA in virtual memory, the current page table pointer is 0xBB, therefore we're reading directory entry from the address 0xCC the directory address contains (...) etc.

kenOfYugen 11y ago

Mindblown! So much concentrated information and so nicely presented! Would like to see more low-level stuff that makes sense.

benwills 11y ago

Not sure if others are having the same experience with it, but I'm finding it just beyond my comprehension, in the best way possible. So I'm not sure how I'd comment on it. And what I mean by 'just beyond my comprehension' is that it's far enough ahead (and also in the direction I'm headed), that I'll be reading it several times before it all really sinks in. In short, I love it. I think this is really fantastic and I wish more folks took the time you did to really walk through more intricate concepts like this. Really, really appreciate the time you put in. Thank you.