3/21/2015

RedHat iTOps: Overview of RAMFS and TMPFS on Linux

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Tuesday,February21,2012

OverviewofRAMFSandTMPFSonLinux

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Usingramfsortmpfsyoucanallocatepartofthephysicalmemorytobeusedasa

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RedHat iTOps: Overview of RAMFS and TMPFS on Linux

partition.Youcanmountthispartitionandstartwritingandreadingfileslikeaharddisk
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partition.SinceyoullbereadingandwritingtotheRAM,itwillbefaster.

51,307

Bothtmpfsandramfsmountwillgiveyouthepoweroffastreadingandwritingfilesfrom

Whenavitalprocessbecomesdrasticallyslowbecauseofdiskwrites,youcanchoose
eitherramfsortmpfsfilesystemsforwritingfilestotheRAM.

andtotheprimarymemory.Whenyoutestthisonasmallfile,youmaynotseeahuge
difference.Youllnoticethedifferenceonlywhenyouwritelargeamountofdatatoafile
withsomeotherprocessingoverheadsuchasnetwork.

1.HowtomountTmpfs
#mkdirp/mnt/tmp

#mountttmpfsosize=20mtmpfs/mnt/tmp

Thelastlineinthefollowingdfkshowstheabovemounted/mnt/tmptmpfsfilesystem.

#dfk

Filesystem1KblocksUsedAvailableUse%Mountedon

/dev/sda23270540050024882604157617%/

/dev/sda11944421856716583611%/boot
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RAMFS
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3/21/2015

RedHat iTOps: Overview of RAMFS and TMPFS on Linux

tmpfs51732005173200%/dev/shm

tmpfs204800204800%/mnt/tmp

2.HowtomountRamfs
#mkdirp/mnt/ram

#mounttramfsosize=20mramfs/mnt/ram

Thelastlineinthefollowingmountcommandshowstheabovemounted/mnt/ramramfs
filesystem.

#mount

/dev/sda2on/typeext3(rw)

procon/proctypeproc(rw)

sysfson/systypesysfs(rw)

devptson/dev/ptstypedevpts(rw,gid=5,mode=620)

/dev/sda1on/boottypeext3(rw)

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RedHat iTOps: Overview of RAMFS and TMPFS on Linux

tmpfson/dev/shmtypetmpfs(rw)

noneon/proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misctypebinfmt_misc(rw)

sunrpcon/var/lib/nfs/rpc_pipefstyperpc_pipefs(rw)

fusectlon/sys/fs/fuse/connectionstypefusectl(rw)

tmpfson/mnt/tmptypetmpfs(rw,size=20m)

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ramfson/mnt/ramtyperamfs(rw,size=20m)

Youcanmountramfsandtmpfsduringboottimebyaddinganentrytothe/etc/fstab.

3.RamfsvsTmpfs
Primarilybothramfsandtmpfsdoesthesamethingwithfewminordifferences.

Ramfswillgrowdynamically.So,youneedcontroltheprocessthatwritesthedata

tomakesureramfsdoesntgoabovetheavailableRAMsizeinthesystem.Letus
sayyouhave2GBofRAMonyoursystemandcreateda1GBramfsandmounted
as/tmp/ram.Whenthetotalsizeofthe/tmp/ramcrosses1GB,youcanstillwritedata
toit.Systemwillnotstopyoufromwritingdatamorethan1GB.However,whenit
goesabovetotalRAMsizeof2GB,thesystemmayhang,asthereisnoplaceinthe
RAMtokeepthedata.
Tmpfswillnotgrowdynamically.Itwouldnotallowyoutowritemorethanthesize

youvespecifiedwhilemountingthetmpfs.So,youdontneedtoworryabout
controllingtheprocessthatwritesthedatatomakesuretmpfsdoesntgoabovethe
specifiedlimit.ItmaygiveerrorssimilartoNospaceleftondevice.
Tmpfsusesswap.
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3/21/2015

RedHat iTOps: Overview of RAMFS and TMPFS on Linux

Ramfsdoesnotuseswap.

4.DisadvantagesofRamfsandTmpfs
SincebothramfsandtmpfsiswritingtothesystemRAM,itwouldgetdeletedoncethe
systemgetsrebooted,orcrashed.So,youshouldwriteaprocesstopickupthedata
fromramfs/tmpfstodiskinperiodicintervals.Youcanalsowriteaprocesstowritedown
thedatafromramfs/tmpfstodiskwhilethesystemisshuttingdown.But,thiswillnothelp
youinthetimeofsystemcrash.

Table:Comparisonoframfsandtmpfs
Experimentation

Tmpfs

Ramfs

Fillmaximumspaceandcontinuewriting Willdisplayerror Willcontinuewriting

FixedSize

Yes

No

UsesSwap

Yes

No

VolatileStorage

Yes

Yes

Ifyouwantyourprocesstowritefaster,optingfortmpfsisabetterchoicewith
precautionsaboutthesystemcrash.

PostedbyiTOpsTubeat9:45AM
Recommend this on Google

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