Bootmem allocator

["A. Supreeth Reddy" <supreeth.reddy@wipro.com>]

Hi All,

I am trying to understand how the bootmem allocator is designed. I have the
following questions in the bootmem allocator.

1. Does it give memory in a sequential fashion in terms of pages or does it
allow any allocation of powers of 2 ?

2. Is only 1/8 th of the whole memory after "_end" given to bootmem
allocator, since in init_bootmem_core () there is something like
		mapsize = (( end - start) + 7)/8;

3. Does the function __alloc_bootmem_alloc () try to concatenate 2
subsequent allocations to avoid internal fragmentation ?

4. And what is the purpose of last_offset and last_pos fields in the
bootmem_data_t structure, I find that they are used only in
__alloc_bootmem_alloc () function.


Thanks in advance,
regards,
Supreeth.


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