Tiny Core Linux

Tiny Core Base => TCB Talk => Topic started by: baz on April 26, 2010, 06:21:37 PM

Title: Need rebuttal to: "all programs on all operating systems run in ram..."
Post by: baz on April 26, 2010, 06:21:37 PM: I was talking to a buddy telling him about how fast TC is, and how it runs completely in ram. Then he said all programs on all operating systems run completely in ram until ram runs out, then the OS simply manages sharing it. He followed that the performance gains in TC are probably due to its size, rather than its design.

This doesn't sit right with me, but I am not sure how to rebut it - what do you guys/gals think?

Cheers,
Baz
Title: Re: Need rebuttal to: "all programs on all operating systems run in ram..."
Post by: gerald_clark on April 26, 2010, 06:33:49 PM: Your buddy is correct about all programs run in RAM.
The difference is that with TC, the filesystem is also in RAM instead of on disk.
Extensions can then be copied to the filesystem ( in RAM ) or mounted from the flash/hard-drive.
Title: Re: Need rebuttal to: "all programs on all operating systems run in ram..."
Post by: danielibarnes on April 26, 2010, 06:36:14 PM: What you mean is load from RAM. In a typical operating system, Linux or Windows, the executable files are stored on the hard drive. The OS copies the executable from the hard drive into memory and then executes it. With Tiny Core, the executable is already in memory, so the copy part of "loading" is much faster. Tiny Core is similar to Bart's Boot disks (http://www.nu2.nu/bootdisk/)
Title: Re: Need rebuttal to: "all programs on all operating systems run in ram..."
Post by: helander on April 27, 2010, 03:09:23 AM: Quote from: danielibarnes on April 26, 2010, 06:36:14 PM
What you mean is load from RAM. In a typical operating system, Linux or Windows, the executable files are stored on the hard drive. The OS copies the executable from the hard drive into memory and then executes it. With Tiny Core, the executable is already in memory, so the copy part of "loading" is much faster. Tiny Core is similar to Bart's Boot disks (http://www.nu2.nu/bootdisk/)

Well, if you choose to copy the extensions to ram then the executables are loaded from ram, but the default TC/MC behavoiur just keeps links to the executables in ram and the actual content is on the mounted squashfs files which resides on "disk". Since the squashfs is compressed the amount to load is reduced. On the downside is the time required to uncompress the loaded data but in total the load+uncompress time is less than the load time of uncompressed data.

/Lars
Title: Re: Need rebuttal to: "all programs on all operating systems run in ram..."
Post by: danielibarnes on April 27, 2010, 02:30:32 PM: Quote
the actual content is on the mounted squashfs files which resides on "disk".

True, I was thinking of cloud mode.
Title: Re: Need rebuttal to: "all programs on all operating systems run in ram..."
Post by: curaga on April 27, 2010, 03:58:28 PM: Even in PPR, the core is in ram. All core library/app accesses are thus blazing fast in every scenario.