3 ms·
You almost certainly do want swap (in the 99.9% case). I had a better / more elaborate explanation bookmarked somewhere but can't find it now, the tldr is a "m
by rollcat 7y ago
You almost certainly do want swap (in the 99.9% case).
I had a better / more elaborate explanation bookmarked somewhere but can't find it now, the tldr is a "modern" OS (past ~2-3 decades) wants the freedom to manage anonymous (malloc) and named (mmio) memory between physical RAM and disk devices. Disabling swap means the OS must always keep the anonymous pages in physical RAM, which negatively impacts any IO-bound workload (can't cache) and, ironically, puts more pressure on the disk.
So unless you have an extremely specific and finely tuned use-case with lots of benchmark data, the OS will almost always make a better call.
- jpwgarrison 7y agoYou do probably want swap, but the comment you are replying to is talking about a swap _partition_ and that is not the only way to do swap. Using a file instead makes it easier to change the size of your swap, some people prefer that.
- rollcat 7y agoAgain, what about sticking to a sensible default that covers the 99.9% case? The installer is hinting you to do the right thing (to create some swap), even if it doesn't provide all the possible myriad options. Swap files vs dedicated partitions have different trade-offs, if you start going that route it's easy to start blaming the installer for having less power/flexibility than invoking debootstrap directly.
- int_19h 7y agoSwap file is a more sensible default in this day and age, at least for the desktop.
- gdxhyrd 7y agoI actually do not want swap, because I don't want paging to disk. Ever. Just let the process crash. I have been running swapless for two decades without any issue.
- JdeBP 7y agoNot providing a paging file only disables one kind of paging. * http://jdebp.uk./FGA/dont-throw-those-paging-files-away.html http://jdebp.uk./FGA/dont-throw-those-paging-files-away.html
- JdeBP 7y agoYou can bookmark http://jdebp.uk./FGA/dont-throw-those-paging-files-away.html http://jdebp.uk./FGA/dont-throw-those-paging-files-away.html instead. (-: