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We need virtual memory to avoid the consequences of memory fragmentation. If every process shares the same address space, you might be unable to start a process
by mrob 3y ago
We need virtual memory to avoid the consequences of memory fragmentation. If every process shares the same address space, you might be unable to start a process despite having plenty of free ram, because that ram is scattered all over the address space. Virtual memory allows the process to see a contiguous range of free memory even when the physical memory is fragmented.
- sesm 3y agoYou make assumptions that programs start and stop often and allocate memory multiple times at runtime. Both assumptions are not true for server software and programs that allocate one big chunk and manage memory on their own, like JVM.