An implementation of storage management in capability environments
Paolo Corsini, Lanfranco Lopriore · Software Practice and Experience · 1995
Abstract The exploitation of the salient features of capability‐based addressing environments leads to a high number of small objects existing in memory at the same time. It is thus necessary to enhance the efficiency of the mechanisms for object relocation, and to avoid congestion of input/output devices due to swapping. In this paper, we present an approach to the management of a large virtual memory space aimed at solving these problems. We insert partial information concerning the physical allocation of each object into the virtual identifier of this object. Objects are grouped into large swapping units, called pages. The page size is independent of the average object size. This results in enhanced efficiency in managing the relocation information both with regard to memory requirements and access times. The allocation of objects into pages, and the movement of pages through the memory hierarchy, are controlled by user processes. This means that programs which have knowledge of their own use of virtual memory can increase their locality of reference, diminish the number of swap operations and reduce fragmentation.