Re: [2.5] Kernel won't release cache unless pushed

[Andrew Morton]

Burton Windle <[e-mail]> wrote:
>
> Hello. In both the 2.5 and 2.4 kernel series, if I do an 'ls -lR' on a
> directory with several gigs of data, the kernel will cache all of the
> metadata (in dentry_cache, I think), which is fine (we don't want ram to
> go to waste).
> 
> However, large malloc's then fail, returning ENOMEM, because the kernel
> won't give up the memory.

Does

	echo 1  > /proc/sys/vm/overcommit_memory

fix it?

There's something borked in the overcommit crystal ball gazing.  It's on
my todo list somewhere.