Memory management in Kernel 2.4.x

[Andreas Hartmann]

Hello all!

Unfortunately, the memory management of kernel 2.4.x didn't get better until 
today. It is very easy to make a machine dead. Take the following script:

http://groups.google.com/groups?q=malloc+bestie&hl=de&lr=&selm=[e-mail]&rnum=2

The result with kernel 2.4.19pre8ac4:

May 27 11:04:21 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 763 (knode).
May 27 11:04:22 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 764 (knode).
May 27 11:04:22 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 765 (knode).
May 27 11:04:22 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 766 (knode).
May 27 11:04:40 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 322 
(mozilla-bin).
May 27 11:04:40 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 324 
(mozilla-bin).
May 27 11:04:40 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 325 
(mozilla-bin).
May 27 11:04:40 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 326 
(mozilla-bin).
May 27 11:04:40 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 327 
(mozilla-bin).
May 27 11:04:40 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 755 
(mozilla-bin).
May 27 11:04:40 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 899 
(mozilla-bin).
May 27 11:04:40 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 902 
(mozilla-bin).
May 27 11:04:40 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 903 
(mozilla-bin).
May 27 11:04:54 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 295 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:05:00 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 293 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:05:05 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 283 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:05:13 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 932 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:05:16 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 287 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:05:31 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 300 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:05:31 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 303 (korgac).
May 27 11:05:37 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 297 (kwikdisk).
May 27 11:06:05 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 292 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:06:46 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 289 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:06:52 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 269 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:06:57 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 304 (kalarmd).
May 27 11:07:18 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 286 (kdeinit).
May 27 11:07:21 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1103 (malloc).
May 27 11:07:21 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1103 (malloc).
May 27 11:07:34 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1104 (malloc).
May 27 11:07:52 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1104 (malloc).
May 27 11:08:04 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1105 (malloc).
May 27 11:09:12 athlon last message repeated 5 times
May 27 11:09:16 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1106 (malloc).
May 27 11:09:24 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1107 (malloc).
May 27 11:09:51 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1108 (malloc).
May 27 11:10:01 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1111 (malloc).
May 27 11:10:07 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1112 (malloc).
May 27 11:10:12 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1115 (malloc).
May 27 11:10:58 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1118 (malloc).
May 27 11:10:59 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1118 (malloc).
May 27 11:11:05 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1124 (malloc).
May 27 11:11:10 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1121 (malloc).
May 27 11:11:18 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1127 (malloc).
May 27 11:11:24 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1130 (malloc).
May 27 11:11:33 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1133 (malloc).
May 27 11:11:44 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1134 (malloc).
May 27 11:11:45 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1135 (malloc).
May 27 11:11:50 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1136 (malloc).
May 27 11:11:59 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1137 (malloc).
May 27 11:12:28 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1138 (malloc).
May 27 11:12:32 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1138 (malloc).
May 27 11:13:04 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1139 (malloc).
May 27 11:13:04 athlon kernel: Out of Memory: Killed process 1139 (malloc).

KDE was down. The machine didn't respond during this fork bomb.

I have got the same problem with an remote rsync via ssh when rsnc breaks 
down because of an data-error when rsyncing about 30 G of datas at the end 
of the session. With 2.4.x-kernels I need a lot of more memory for this 
process than with kernel 2.2.

Kind regards,
Andreas Hartmann