swap file vs. swap partition

[Dotan Cohen]

On 7/31/05, akonstam at trinity.edu <akonstam at trinity.edu> wrote:
> On Sun, Jul 31, 2005 at 12:49:11AM +0300, Dotan Cohen wrote:
> >
> > I'm certainly not the guy with good luck in general...
> > I plan on using space from my /home partion, which is on /dev/hda2. So
> > I will not be tampering with the root file system. In your opinion,
> > does this sound safe?
> >
> > Also, since this is hda2 and not hda1, the swap partion will wind up
> > in the middle or outside edge of the disk, no? That is the 'bad' place
> > to put it according to other posters in this thread. Or am I looking
> > at it backwards?
> Well here is the deal. As another poster said , seek time is the major
> part of the time of addressing a disk. If you believe that on average
> your heads will be closer to the center of the disk , moving to a
> place on a swap partition will be faster.
> 
> If it is true that swap files are as fast as swap partitions to access
> I would strongly urge you to go for a swap file. It is less risky and
> easier to do.
> 
> The discussion of whether access to  the outside of the disk or the
> inside is faster is specious. How quickly you can get to a part of the
> disk to access data depends largely where the heads were on the last
> access.
> 
> >
> > Thank you for sharing your insight, and for reviewing that article for
> > me. As usual, this 'little project' turned into a big learning
> > experience for me. I see that as a good thing!
> >
> > Dotan
> > http://song-lirics.com/sl/artist/325/marcy-playground-lirics.php
> > Marcy Playground music and lirics
> 
> --
> 
> =======================================================================
> "You who hate the Jews so, why did you adopt their religion?"
> -- Friedrich Nietzsche, addressing anti-semitic Christians
> -------------------------------------------
> Aaron Konstam
> Computer Science
> Trinity University
> telephone: (210)-999-7484
> 

OK, I think that I'm convinced to go with the swap file, and not the
partition...

My / partion has only about 3 gigs of it's 7 available, but the /home
partion has about 8 of its 9 gigs available. Could I put the swap file
on the /home partition? I don't see how I could tell it where to be by
what I've read today regarding creating swap files. How is this done?

I really appreciate everybody who is helping me. You guys are the greatest!

Dotan
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