From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Message-ID: To: 9fans@cse.psu.edu Subject: Re: [9fans] Virtual memory & paging From: "rob pike" MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Date: Sun, 3 Feb 2002 16:21:08 -0500 Topicbox-Message-UUID: 4ae75d84-eaca-11e9-9e20-41e7f4b1d025 I don't know that anyone else makes this distinction, but to me virtual memory is a technique an operating system can use to manage user memory, while paging is a technique for coping with a shortfall in physical memory. VM manages memory by using page faults to fill in the user address space; paging is just swapping a page at a time. The relationship between these notions is primarily that both permit the process to execute when it is not entirely resident. By these definitions, it is possible (easy even) to build a system with virtual memory but no paging. Even I can do it. -rob