Linux Memory (again)

Mon Nov 9 06:22:00 MST 2020

>> Micheal. Makes me wonder what hardware or architecture you are using
(hardware) There might be some things that you can do based on that.

My current hardware is a plane dell xps15 9350 (~2015), i7 proc, 1tb nvme,
and loaded out with 64gb ram.  It's got an nvidia gpu, but I've never
gotten prime as a hot mess to work, so mostly rely on the intel gpu.

Before this my desktop, was a dell precision 7950, dual xeon socket/cpu,
20/40 cores/threads, 128gb ram, dual raid1 nvme disks, and an nvidia
1070gtx gpu.

I'm willing to throw some money at a problem obviously to make it go away,
I just can't seem to still make them go away.  My next system will likely
be a ryzen/threadripper.

-mb

On Sun, Nov 8, 2020 at 8:19 PM Stephen Partington via PLUG-discuss <
plug-discuss at lists.phxlinux.org> wrote:

> Micheal. Makes me wonder what hardware or architecture you are using
> (hardware) There might be some things that you can do based on that.
>
> I know and Machines have felt very different in memory management than
> intel. Even their Bulldozer architecture they really still felt very
> snappy. And threadripper takes this to a new level with quad-channel
> memory. Epyc takes it even further with 8 channel memory. while it may not
> resolve the way it is handled it may lessen the impact.
>
> On Sun, Nov 8, 2020 at 7:45 PM Eric Oyen via PLUG-discuss <
> plug-discuss at lists.phxlinux.org> wrote:
>
>> Yeah, It isn’t just on linux where some of these apps have issues. OS X
>> also sees a lot of the same issues (I never maintain more than 4 open tabs
>> of Chrome and I don’t bother with Firefox as it’s an accessibility
>> nightmare under VoiceOver screen reader). About the only DM’s in linux
>> where the ORCA screen reader and braille facilities work best are GTK based
>> ones (like Gnome, FVWM, and some others) and won’t even work at all in KDE
>> without significant modifications to the KDE environment (and even then,
>> with only partial accessibility).
>>
>> The reason I bring up the accessibility issue is that these memory hogs
>> can have detrimental effects on screen reader and braille display
>> performance Most times on a linux system, I will simply just use either
>> ORCA for the DM or go to Emacsspeak for console mode and use Lynx (or one
>> of its variants) for web browsing. Much smaller footprint. As for office
>> apps, I haven’t found anything out there that isn’t a memory hog in one way
>> or another. So, I do what I can to minimize those issues. About the only
>> thing I have been unable to do is have the screen reader read remotely fed
>> apps (forwarded X display types) They appear only as a graphic interface
>> with no content inside of them. Considering the versatility of Linux and
>> most Linux based apps, this is a glaring issue that seriously needs to be
>> resolved.
>>
>> Btw, as far as memory issues goes, I really wish we could go back to the
>> days of programming when everything had to be tight to fit into a small ram
>> footprint. Sure, those programs were a little less user friendly, but they
>> didn’t have nearly the bugs or the bloat of current apps.
>>
>> Just my 2 cents worth.
>>
>> -Eric
>> From the Central Offices of the Technomage Guild, Memory allocation and
>> configuration Dept.
>>
>>
>>
>> On Nov 8, 2020, at 1:24 PM, Michael Butash via PLUG-discuss <
>> plug-discuss at lists.phxlinux.org> wrote:
>>
>> Inline here:
>>
>> On Fri, Nov 6, 2020 at 6:28 PM Steve Litt via PLUG-discuss <
>> plug-discuss at lists.phxlinux.org> wrote:
>>
>>> On Fri, 6 Nov 2020 07:48:40 -0700
>>> Michael Butash via PLUG-discuss <plug-discuss at lists.phxlinux.org> wrote:
>>>
>>> Chrome/Chromium and Firefox are absolute pigs. I finally tamed Firefox
>>> ty setting it to drop all cache and other stuff upon exit, and then I
>>> shut down all instances of Firefox every day.
>>>
>>
>> They all are pigs I find.  Tried Brave, Chrome, Chromium, and keep ending
>> up back at firefox as a lesser of evils.  Chrome is the new IE, so now I
>> *need* it occasionally for plugins.  I've been using tab suspenders across
>> each, doesn't help much.
>>
>> My problem is I have to keep different profiles for different companies I
>> work with, usually no less than 4-6 at a time, 2 at least for my personal
>> gsuite and work.  Mostly I do so for M$ O365/Teams, as they can't figure
>> out how to make it work across organizations or seemingly comprehend why
>> anyone would.  Hint: Consultants that work for 5-10 orgs at a time.  Each
>> profile just ends up hoarding ram, which ends up being 30-40gb at times on
>> my system.
>>
>> I don't know how many VMs you run, but those eat up memory.
>>>
>>
>> I have a mainstream Win10 build with visio and other windoze-y crap I
>> need, 8gb of ram, and keep a few win10 ameliorated editions for clients to
>> minimize footprint with 4gb.  Usually only 2 windoze, 1 if I can.
>> Occasionally a few other 2-4gb ram linux systems, but typically ~20gb for
>> vbox and my vms.  It's where all the other memory goes I have a hard time
>> with, which I really can't identify.
>>
>> What the heck kind of editor requires 3-4GB RAM? That sounds crazy to
>>> me. Why do you have a few dozen files open simultaneously?
>>>
>>
>> Fine questions really, this tends to be where I'm bit odd.  I've found
>> whether using Pluma, Gedit, or even qqnotepad, they all tend to get a bit
>> crazy with a lot of tabs.  I presume things like undo memory, things like
>> that are adding up, but I'm still like geez, really?
>>
>> Why so many?  I mostly do network and security consulting, with config
>> files from existing devices, resulting operational output extracted in
>> text, across multiple orgs at a time.  Not to mention configuration changes
>> I'm making for template deployment off those, so it gets a bit crazy
>> flipping between dozens of configs at a time.
>>
>> If I could find better ways to manage some of this, it would be nice, but
>> seems everything just dumps this sort of thing into memory hoarding.
>>
>> Libreoffice is kind of a pig. Is there something else you can use? And
>>> why a dozen or two simultaneous files open? This sounds like a workflow
>>> nightmare. Do you mean one Libreoffice instance with 24 files open, or
>>> a bunch of separate Libreoffices in VMs. If the latter, yeah, that's
>>> going to burn a lot of RAM, even more than one instance with 24
>>> documents.
>>>
>>
>> I often blame Libreoffice, only to kill it with like 20 spreadsheets
>> open, and 30 write files and find it was using (only) around 4gb of ram.  I
>> take notes a lot in libre because it's restore on crash has proven pretty
>> flawless vs., well anything else.  I mostly prefer pluma for text input and
>> notes, but no good restore.  Tried qqnotepad that had a restore function,
>> it was highly dysfunctional.
>>
>>
>>> Ohhhh, KDE. I call that Krash, Delay, Expand. See
>>> http://troubleshooters.com/lpm/201202/201202.htm . I use OpenBox, which
>>> is a low-RAM, just-the-facts window manager. On every machine I ever
>>> used KDE, performance was bad and on lower RAM machines, things ground
>>> to a halt.
>>>
>>> Gnome and KDE are luxuries for folks with lightning fast processors and
>>> huge quantities of RAM, who want their computers to perform like a 2015
>>> computer with 4GB RAM.
>>>
>>
>> Yes KDE is a pain, but both pretty and functional.  I like it, though it
>> friggin' hates me.  Tried Mate/Cinnamon, i3, xfce, others randomly, just
>> never cared for most.
>>
>> My work and life on a single pc blend probably too much, but when I still
>> can't seem to work functionally with 64-128gb of ram that simply no one
>> else uses but me, I'm like wtf is wrong with my setup.
>>
>>
>>> I'm running a 2014 computer:
>>> * AMD A6-6400K APU with Radeon(tm) HD Graphics (dual core)
>>>         - 3.1Ghz dualcore
>>> * 16GB RAM
>>> * Openbox with dmenu and UMENU2
>>>
>>> With no browsers open, this machine is is snappy as hell. With firefox
>>> set to dump cache upon exit, as long as I do reasonable housekeeping on
>>> tabs, and prophylactically close all firefox instances at least once a
>>> day, everything's pretty good.
>>>
>>> That being said, this is a 2014 machine, so I'm soon buying a 3.6 Ghz 6
>>> core (65 watt) with 64GB RAM. This will give me more latitude in
>>> running Chromium, which I need for Jitsi, and allow me less stringent
>>> housekeeping in Firefox.
>>>
>>
>> Perhaps this is just the price for working as I do.  I also tend to keep
>> things open to work perpetually as who needs work/life balance, so purging
>> things would likely help.
>>
>> Trying to work as I do under windoze as a test, it just couldn't hang.
>> Perhaps I expect too much of linux, but it's far more capable at least,
>> though when it gets wonky, it does so fast.
>>
>> Thanks for the input here, I do appreciate it, as perhaps as said I am
>> simply going about things a wrong way, thus the ask.
>>
>>
>>>
>>> SteveT
>>>
>>> Steve Litt
>>> Autumn 2020 featured book: Thriving in Tough Times
>>> http://www.troubleshooters.com/thrive
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>
>
> --
> A mouse trap, placed on top of your alarm clock, will prevent you from
> rolling over and going back to sleep after you hit the snooze button.
>
> Stephen
>
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