Linux Memory Accounting

  • From: "Jared Still" <jkstill@xxxxxxxxx>
  • To: "Oracle-L Freelists" <oracle-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2006 12:47:09 -0700

Does anyone have a fairly accurate method for determining
how much memory is actually being used on a Linux box?

The linux in question is RedHat Enterprise Server 4.

Before dashing off a reply to use 'ps -F' to get the RSS
column, or using pmap -qx to get the various memory
segment sizes, or using /proc/PID/stats|statsm|status|,
please consider that these methods do not work, as Linux
does not always correctly report the memory in use.

Is there any other method that you have found to
work correctly?  I will define 'correctly' here as
within 10% of what the actual memory use is.


-- Jared Still Certifiable Oracle DBA and Part Time Perl Evangelist

Other related posts: