[issue1679] Machine unresponsive with cache_lock: blocked on... message

[Francois Tigeot]

On Sat, Mar 20, 2010 at 11:52:51PM +0000, elekktretterr (via DragonFly issue tracker) wrote:
> 
> elekktretterr <elekktretterr at exemail.com.au> added the comment:
> 
> >     If that much is constantly swapped out (and swapcache isn't being
> >     used) then the run-time footprint is larger then the 3G of ram the
> >     32bit kernel can use.
> 
> What do you mean run-time footprint?
> 
> Memory: 967M Active, 1871M Inact, 527M Wired, 72M Cache, 199M Buf, 71M Free
> Swap: 4096M Total, 816M Used, 3280M Free, 19% Inuse
> 
> I cannot figure out whats using so much active and inactive memory. It
> only runs a not-so busy postgres database (although it does have rather
> large 2-3gb dataset). However I do notice that everytime hammer cleanup
> runs. ie after restart, the memory usage goes up all the way to swap.

This one is from a recently started workstation:

  8:10AM  up 17 mins, 2 users, load averages: 0.77, 0.70, 0.47

  Memory: 1094M Active, 1519M Inact, 272M Wired, 114M Cache, 199M Buf, 4460K Free
  Swap: 4096M Total, 13M Used, 4083M Free, 2048K Out

The only applications running were Xorg, a bunch of xterms and a web browser
(seamonkey) with 3 tabs open.

I then launched a "hammer cleanup". After a while, the system started to push
application memory to swap. I could see a delay in window redrawing when
switching from one web tab to the other.

Now that "hammer cleanup" has finished running, there is no more swapping but
there are still gobs of active and inactive memory:

Memory: 990M Active, 1609M Inact, 353M Wired, 7328K Cache, 199M Buf, 46M Free
Swap: 4096M Total, 18M Used, 4078M Free

-- 
Francois Tigeot