Why am I using swap?

[Jeff Vian]

On Mon, 2005-08-08 at 16:40 +0100, Dan Track wrote:
> HI
> 
> I just rebooted my workstation, and I ran a "free -m". I realised that
> I'm already using swap even though I've got so much free ram. Anyone
> know why this is?
> 
> free -m
>              total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
> Mem:          1244       1227         17          0         37        636
                                    ^^^^^^^^
What do you mean "so much free ram".  Whatever you have running is using
almost 99% of your memory and only 17 mb free. While that small amount
free is normal on my systems, the amount used is much higher than I
routinely run.  The tiny amount of swap used (13 mb) is insignificant.

> -/+ buffers/cache:        553        691
> Swap:         1993         13       1979
> 

This is mine after running for more than 5 days.
 $ free -m
         total      used     free   shared  buffers   cached
 Mem:     1011       991       19        0       13      703
 -/+ buffers/cache:  274      736
 Swap:    1023         0     1023

> 
> Thanks
> Dan
>