Memory usage tip

[naugtur]

Hi

I saw some issues (moaning? ) on memory usage caused by apache etc.
Propably some of You do not know (I didn't) that Linux buffers lots of stuff into memory and releases only when needed.
If You get nervous seeing plug's mem too extensively used try this:

sync
echo 3 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches

and stop worrying
Know any other ways of "manual garbae collecting"?


PS. My first post, so hello there fellow plug owners!

[birdman]

If You get nervous seeing plug's mem too extensively used try this:

sync
echo 3 > /proc/sys/vm/drop_caches

You may need to do this twice (from experience on x86_64 systems).    Also - it doesn't really "free" much memory. It can free up some slabinfo tablespace , but most of what it releases is only in use because nothing else needs it.  So if the memory usage in top frightens you, just remember that most of the space in "buffers" is free-to-be-used-when-needed anyway.