* [9fans] install "out of physical memory" @ 2006-09-17 14:06 chuckf 2006-09-17 18:31 ` erik quanstrom 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: chuckf @ 2006-09-17 14:06 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans; +Cc: kruhft Hallo, I read this in the archives regarding the Compaq. I"m having the same problem with physical memory. I don"t quite understand how you overcame it. Can you explain in more detail? Do i copy another program to the floppy..like "9pccd.gz" Does it contain a different swap routine? Do I need a utility program? I tried "swapon" and named a linuxswap portion... didn't help. ........from archives 2005 July...... The major installation problem was that the system was constantly running out of physical memory during the distmount phase. After a bunch of hunting and exploration, it looked like the kernel was only reporting about 3k free pages of free physical memory, with about 16k pages of swap (approx numbers). I managed to get the plan9 partion 'preped' with a swap, so after copying the swap utility from the plan9 boot image (9pccd.gz) to a shared ext2 partition i was able to use it from the plan9 install image (9pcflop.gz) and fire up the swap file so I could sucessfully perform the install. Everything went smoothly with the install after that and I'm now booting plan9 from the harddrive using grub. :) After this experience, I have a feeling that either there's a bug in my comp's mainboard which causes problems with the physical memory calculation or (since I don't know much about the kernel yet) it has a hardcoded max somewhere that is limiting my available memory. Any comments on this problem or suggestions on how to fix it? And finally, I would suggest to the iso maintainers that they put the swap utility in the 9pcflop.gz image and some instructions in the installation/installer to enable the swap file when it's created so others don't have this kind of problem. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 14:06 [9fans] install "out of physical memory" chuckf @ 2006-09-17 18:31 ` erik quanstrom 2006-09-17 19:13 ` Chuck Foreman 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: erik quanstrom @ 2006-09-17 18:31 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans i'm afraid to ask. how much memory is in the machine? - erik ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 18:31 ` erik quanstrom @ 2006-09-17 19:13 ` Chuck Foreman 2006-09-17 19:22 ` Russ Cox 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: Chuck Foreman @ 2006-09-17 19:13 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs Hallo, Vintage 1997.... The max...2x64 + on board 16.....= 144K Can't it swap? At 08:31 PM 9/17/2006, you wrote: >i'm afraid to ask. how much memory is in the machine? > >- erik ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 19:13 ` Chuck Foreman @ 2006-09-17 19:22 ` Russ Cox [not found] ` <ee9e417a0609171222v1163c0d5k49987948781fc714@mail.gmail.co m> 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: Russ Cox @ 2006-09-17 19:22 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs > Vintage 1997.... > The max...2x64 + on board 16.....= 144K > Can't it swap? Not really, no. But 128M (it may not recognize the 16) should be fine. You might try setting kernelpercent=20 in plan9.ini on a boot floppy. (If you really meant 144K and not 144M, then good luck getting the kernel into memory. ;-) Russ ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
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* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" [not found] ` <ee9e417a0609171222v1163c0d5k49987948781fc714@mail.gmail.co m> @ 2006-09-17 20:05 ` Chuck Foreman 2006-09-17 20:33 ` Russ Cox 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: Chuck Foreman @ 2006-09-17 20:05 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs Russ, Thanks for replying. Indeed it's 144 meg.. or 128 if the onboard is not recognized. My floppy image doesn't appear to have a plan9.ini file... "none found" That's the last message before the °use dma..." my boot looks like this... 24M memory: 11M kernel data, 12M user, 77M swap kfs....version....time init starting /bin/rc /bin/dos/srv: serving #s/dos rc (boota:) : null list in concatenation rc (boota:) : null list in concatenation cp: can't sta /n/a:/plan9.ini: 'n/a/plan9.ini doesn't exist' I am in the textonly install and the problem occurs at the end as I try to locate and mount the distribution archive.. shortly after 16% " out of physical memory ...no swap configured... Can I configure swap prior to this ...? At 09:22 PM 9/17/2006, you wrote: >>Vintage 1997.... >>The max...2x64 + on board 16.....= 144K >>Can't it swap? > >Not really, no. But 128M (it may not recognize the 16) >should be fine. You might try setting kernelpercent=20 >in plan9.ini on a boot floppy. > >(If you really meant 144K and not 144M, >then good luck getting the kernel into memory. ;-) > >Russ ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 20:05 ` Chuck Foreman @ 2006-09-17 20:33 ` Russ Cox 2006-09-17 20:40 ` John Floren [not found] ` <ee9e417a0609171333t228a677eh39d1db121c39ab21@mail.gmail.co m> 0 siblings, 2 replies; 19+ messages in thread From: Russ Cox @ 2006-09-17 20:33 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs > my boot looks like this... > 24M memory: 11M kernel data, 12M user, 77M swap > kfs....version....time This is the problem -- the kernel only detected 24M of memory. Not sure why. Russ ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 20:33 ` Russ Cox @ 2006-09-17 20:40 ` John Floren 2006-09-17 21:01 ` geoff [not found] ` <ee9e417a0609171333t228a677eh39d1db121c39ab21@mail.gmail.co m> 1 sibling, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: John Floren @ 2006-09-17 20:40 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs On 9/17/06, Russ Cox <rsc@swtch.com> wrote: > > my boot looks like this... > > 24M memory: 11M kernel data, 12M user, 77M swap > > kfs....version....time > > This is the problem -- the kernel only detected 24M of memory. > Not sure why. > > Russ > On a similar note, does the kernel automatically detect and use swap space upon boot? I just went back and resized my fossil partition to add swap (in case I managed to fill my memory somehow); do I need to have a line in cpurc to turn on swap for that partition, or is it automagic? Thanks John F. -- "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers" -- Shakespeare, Henry VI ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 20:40 ` John Floren @ 2006-09-17 21:01 ` geoff 2006-09-17 21:03 ` John Floren 2006-09-17 21:10 ` Bruce Ellis 0 siblings, 2 replies; 19+ messages in thread From: geoff @ 2006-09-17 21:01 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans It's not automatic; you need to add something like swap /dev/sdC0/swap to cpurc or cpurc.local. Others feel that there are serious bugs in the swapping (paging) code but I've had good luck with it. If you expect to swap regularly, you should keep any local file systems on different disks from your swap space, or performance will suffer badly when you swap. It's also possible to swap to a file server (e.g., `swap /n/other/swap') but you'll want to use switched Ethernet if you do that. If it's possible, it's almost certainly a better idea to add more RAM to your machine. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 21:01 ` geoff @ 2006-09-17 21:03 ` John Floren 2006-09-17 21:23 ` geoff 2006-09-17 21:10 ` Bruce Ellis 1 sibling, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: John Floren @ 2006-09-17 21:03 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs On 9/17/06, geoff@plan9.bell-labs.com <geoff@plan9.bell-labs.com> wrote: > It's not automatic; you need to add something like > > swap /dev/sdC0/swap > > to cpurc or cpurc.local. Others feel that there are serious bugs in > the swapping (paging) code but I've had good luck with it. > > If you expect to swap regularly, you should keep any local file > systems on different disks from your swap space, or performance will > suffer badly when you swap. It's also possible to swap to a file > server (e.g., `swap /n/other/swap') but you'll want to use switched > Ethernet if you do that. If it's possible, it's almost certainly a > better idea to add more RAM to your machine. > I already have a good deal of RAM (320 MB or so) in my machine, but if I put much load on it I'm a bit concerned about running out. Thought I'd ask. John -- "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers" -- Shakespeare, Henry VI ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 21:03 ` John Floren @ 2006-09-17 21:23 ` geoff 0 siblings, 0 replies; 19+ messages in thread From: geoff @ 2006-09-17 21:23 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans 320MB should be ample unless you are running venti or fossil on that machine and allocate lots of memory to caches. Plan 9 generally consumes much less memory than other systems. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 21:01 ` geoff 2006-09-17 21:03 ` John Floren @ 2006-09-17 21:10 ` Bruce Ellis 2006-09-17 21:18 ` erik quanstrom 1 sibling, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: Bruce Ellis @ 2006-09-17 21:10 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs i've never had problems with swap. my setup at the labs was diskless "terminal" with lotsa ram and swap on /n/other. it never failed, tho swap was really only there to cope with extraordinary circumstances. i have a similar setup in sydney tho "other" is local. killing a random process is not a solution. it's an egregious hack. brucee On 9/18/06, geoff@plan9.bell-labs.com <geoff@plan9.bell-labs.com> wrote: > It's not automatic; you need to add something like > > swap /dev/sdC0/swap > > to cpurc or cpurc.local. Others feel that there are serious bugs in > the swapping (paging) code but I've had good luck with it. > > If you expect to swap regularly, you should keep any local file > systems on different disks from your swap space, or performance will > suffer badly when you swap. It's also possible to swap to a file > server (e.g., `swap /n/other/swap') but you'll want to use switched > Ethernet if you do that. If it's possible, it's almost certainly a > better idea to add more RAM to your machine. > ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 21:10 ` Bruce Ellis @ 2006-09-17 21:18 ` erik quanstrom 2006-09-17 21:20 ` Bruce Ellis 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: erik quanstrom @ 2006-09-17 21:18 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans let's face it. there are some questions that are best left unasked. buy lots of memory, keep a swap partition and keep your fingers crossed that you never need an answer to that question --- what do i do when i run out of memory! either that, or do like knuth. we keep a fixed tablesize for everything. we size these variables to the memory size of the machine, then we will never run out of memory. if you try to start one too many processes, it will helpfully give an error message before you start. ;-) - erik On Sun Sep 17 16:11:27 CDT 2006, bruce.ellis@gmail.com wrote: > i've never had problems with swap. my setup at the labs was diskless > "terminal" with lotsa ram and swap on /n/other. it never failed, tho swap > was really only there to cope with extraordinary circumstances. > > i have a similar setup in sydney tho "other" is local. > > killing a random process is not a solution. it's an egregious hack. > > brucee > ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 21:18 ` erik quanstrom @ 2006-09-17 21:20 ` Bruce Ellis 2006-09-17 23:32 ` erik quanstrom 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: Bruce Ellis @ 2006-09-17 21:20 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs fixed size is no option. try building gs. brucee On 9/18/06, erik quanstrom <quanstro@quanstro.net> wrote: > let's face it. there are some questions that are best left unasked. buy > lots of memory, keep a swap partition and keep your fingers crossed > that you never need an answer to that question --- what do i do when > i run out of memory! > > either that, or do like knuth. we keep a fixed tablesize for everything. > we size these variables to the memory size of the machine, then we > will never run out of memory. if you try to start one too many processes, > it will helpfully give an error message before you start. ;-) > > - erik > > On Sun Sep 17 16:11:27 CDT 2006, bruce.ellis@gmail.com wrote: > > i've never had problems with swap. my setup at the labs was diskless > > "terminal" with lotsa ram and swap on /n/other. it never failed, tho swap > > was really only there to cope with extraordinary circumstances. > > > > i have a similar setup in sydney tho "other" is local. > > > > killing a random process is not a solution. it's an egregious hack. > > > > brucee > > > ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 21:20 ` Bruce Ellis @ 2006-09-17 23:32 ` erik quanstrom 2006-09-18 1:20 ` geoff 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: erik quanstrom @ 2006-09-17 23:32 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans isn't it a bit tenuous bolstering your argument with ghostscript? :-) - erik On Sun Sep 17 16:22:51 CDT 2006, bruce.ellis@gmail.com wrote: > fixed size is no option. try building gs. > > brucee ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 23:32 ` erik quanstrom @ 2006-09-18 1:20 ` geoff 0 siblings, 0 replies; 19+ messages in thread From: geoff @ 2006-09-18 1:20 UTC (permalink / raw) To: 9fans Well, the general case is `cd /sys/src; mk all', but building gs cuts directly to the pain and suffering. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
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* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" [not found] ` <ee9e417a0609171333t228a677eh39d1db121c39ab21@mail.gmail.co m> @ 2006-09-17 22:35 ` Chuck Foreman 2006-09-18 3:34 ` Burton Samograd 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: Chuck Foreman @ 2006-09-17 22:35 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs Russ, I found the plan9.ini on the floppy and added the kernelpercent=20... it got up to 25% before giving up! I found a reference in the archives where another user speculated about this error! What do you think of the workaround? ........from archives 2005 July...... The major installation problem was that the system was constantly running out of physical memory during the distmount phase. After a bunch of hunting and exploration, it looked like the kernel was only reporting about 3k free pages of free physical memory, with about 16k pages of swap (approx numbers). I managed to get the plan9 partion 'preped' with a swap, so after copying the swap utility from the plan9 boot image (9pccd.gz) to a shared ext2 partition i was able to use it from the plan9 install image (9pcflop.gz) and fire up the swap file so I could successfully perform the install. Everything went smoothly with the install after that and I'm now booting plan9 from the harddrive using grub. :) After this experience, I have a feeling that either there's a bug in my comp's mainboard which causes problems with the physical memory calculation or (since I don't know much about the kernel yet) it has a hardcoded max somewhere that is limiting my available memory. Any comments on this problem or suggestions on how to fix it? And finally, I would suggest to the iso maintainers that they put the swap utility in the 9pcflop.gz image and some instructions in the installation/installer to enable the swap file when it's created so others don't have this kind of problem. At 10:33 PM 9/17/2006, you wrote: >>my boot looks like this... >>24M memory: 11M kernel data, 12M user, 77M swap >>kfs....version....time > >This is the problem -- the kernel only detected 24M of memory. >Not sure why. > >Russ ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" 2006-09-17 22:35 ` Chuck Foreman @ 2006-09-18 3:34 ` Burton Samograd [not found] ` <7155ede00609172034w1d7ee768paff34c7577d6178a@mail.gmail.co m> 0 siblings, 1 reply; 19+ messages in thread From: Burton Samograd @ 2006-09-18 3:34 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs [-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 2304 bytes --] > I found the plan9.ini on the floppy and added the kernelpercent=20... > it got up to 25% before > giving up! > I found a reference in the archives where another user speculated > about this error! > What do you think of the workaround? I've been chatting with Chuck offlist and it seems the he has the same problem I had with the Compaq physical memory layout and the memory probing code that's found in the kernel. Although the machine has 128M, the kernel can only find 16M and runs out during the install. It can't seem to boot from CD, but works fine from the floppy...unfortunately the swap program isn't installed on the floppy (but is on the CD), so I had to figure out a workaround to enable swap to perofrm the install. Basically, I copied the swap program from the plan9 install cd to an ext2 partition on the same machine, booted from the floppy, mounted the partition and ran swap from there, which then allowed the install to happen smoothly. This was after the first out of memory failure during the initial install, but the install partition had already been prepared so you could just enable the swap created during that initial failed install to allow for the second install to work (simple isn't it ;-) I played with the memory probing code and I *think* I might have gotten all my memory recognized by raising the upper address limit that the probe routine went to. This was a while back, but I did run plan9 exclusively as my only OS on that machine for about 3 months, and I do remember solving a number of problems (but unforunately didn't have much net access so I couldn't write about them at the time). I put a little bit of a request during my solution (the reference that Chuck posted) to put the swap program on the install floppy (if space permits), but I guess that was missed. Maybe this could be a second request so this workaround doesn't have to confuse new users. If I recall there was also a problem with the card not having a listing in vgadb; unfortunately that laptop has since gone to pasture so I can't even attempt to recall what that was. Once everything was working, it ran plan9 just great thought :D -- burton samograd aka kruhft http://www.myspace.com/kruhft http://kruhft.boldlygoingnowhere.org [-- Attachment #2: Type: text/html, Size: 2487 bytes --] ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
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* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory" [not found] ` <7155ede00609172034w1d7ee768paff34c7577d6178a@mail.gmail.co m> @ 2006-09-18 18:28 ` Chuck Foreman 0 siblings, 0 replies; 19+ messages in thread From: Chuck Foreman @ 2006-09-18 18:28 UTC (permalink / raw) To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs Hi, I'm going to try this swap enabler thing! Can somebody tell me where the "swap" program is and the correct syntax. I suspect I either have to add it to the floppy or put it in a mountable/ executable place as proposed by Burton. Once booted from the floppy ...could I remove the floppy and mount the CD.-ROM in its place? I'll also be playing with the installer to see if I can't trick the graphics to work... Any other tips ie memory probing code ... etc would be helpful. Thanks for all the feedback!! Feeling a bit frustrated... At 05:34 AM 9/18/2006, you wrote: > > I found the plan9.ini on the floppy and added the kernelpercent=20... > > it got up to 25% before > > giving up! > > > I found a reference in the archives where another user speculated > > about this error! > > What do you think of the workaround? > >I've been chatting with Chuck offlist and it seems the he has the >same problem I had with the Compaq physical memory layout and the >memory probing code that's found in the kernel. Although the >machine has 128M, the kernel can only find 16M and runs out during >the install. It can't seem to boot from CD, but works fine from the >floppy...unfortunately the swap program isn't installed on the >floppy (but is on the CD), so I had to figure out a workaround to >enable swap to perofrm the install. > >Basically, I copied the swap program from the plan9 install cd to an >ext2 partition on the same machine, booted from the floppy, mounted >the partition and ran swap from there, which then allowed the >install to happen smoothly. This was after the first out of memory >failure during the initial install, but the install partition had >already been prepared so you could just enable the swap created >during that initial failed install to allow for the second install >to work (simple isn't it ;-) > >I played with the memory probing code and I *think* I might have >gotten all my memory recognized by raising the upper address limit >that the probe routine went to. This was a while back, but I did >run plan9 exclusively as my only OS on that machine for about 3 >months, and I do remember solving a number of problems (but >unforunately didn't have much net access so I couldn't write about >them at the time). > >I put a little bit of a request during my solution (the reference >that Chuck posted) to put the swap program on the install floppy (if >space permits), but I guess that was missed. Maybe this could be a >second request so this workaround doesn't have to confuse new users. > >If I recall there was also a problem with the card not having a >listing in vgadb; unfortunately that laptop has since gone to >pasture so I can't even attempt to recall what that was. > >Once everything was working, it ran plan9 just great thought :D > >-- >burton samograd aka kruhft ><http://www.myspace.com/kruhft>http://www.myspace.com/kruhft >http://kruhft.boldlygoingnowhere.org ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
* Re: [9fans] install "out of physical memory"
@ 2006-09-17 19:23 Chuck Foreman
0 siblings, 0 replies; 19+ messages in thread
From: Chuck Foreman @ 2006-09-17 19:23 UTC (permalink / raw)
To: Fans of the OS Plan 9 from Bell Labs
oops in that flashback I meant megs not K
Hallo,
Vintage 1997....
The max...2x64 + on board 16.....= 144MB
Can't it swap?
At 08:31 PM 9/17/2006, you wrote:
>i'm afraid to ask. how much memory is in the machine?
>
>- erik
^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 19+ messages in thread
end of thread, other threads:[~2006-09-18 18:28 UTC | newest] Thread overview: 19+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed) -- links below jump to the message on this page -- 2006-09-17 14:06 [9fans] install "out of physical memory" chuckf 2006-09-17 18:31 ` erik quanstrom 2006-09-17 19:13 ` Chuck Foreman 2006-09-17 19:22 ` Russ Cox [not found] ` <ee9e417a0609171222v1163c0d5k49987948781fc714@mail.gmail.co m> 2006-09-17 20:05 ` Chuck Foreman 2006-09-17 20:33 ` Russ Cox 2006-09-17 20:40 ` John Floren 2006-09-17 21:01 ` geoff 2006-09-17 21:03 ` John Floren 2006-09-17 21:23 ` geoff 2006-09-17 21:10 ` Bruce Ellis 2006-09-17 21:18 ` erik quanstrom 2006-09-17 21:20 ` Bruce Ellis 2006-09-17 23:32 ` erik quanstrom 2006-09-18 1:20 ` geoff [not found] ` <ee9e417a0609171333t228a677eh39d1db121c39ab21@mail.gmail.co m> 2006-09-17 22:35 ` Chuck Foreman 2006-09-18 3:34 ` Burton Samograd [not found] ` <7155ede00609172034w1d7ee768paff34c7577d6178a@mail.gmail.co m> 2006-09-18 18:28 ` Chuck Foreman 2006-09-17 19:23 Chuck Foreman
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