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MADVISE(2)		   Linux Programmer's Manual		    MADVISE(2)

NAME
       madvise - give advice about use of memory

SYNOPSIS
       #include <sys/mman.h>

       int madvise(void *addr, size_t length, int advice);

   Feature Test Macro Requirements for glibc (see feature_test_macros(7)):

       madvise(): _BSD_SOURCE

DESCRIPTION
       The madvise() system call advises the kernel about how to handle paging
       input/output in the address range beginning at address  addr  and  with
       size  length bytes.  It allows an application to tell the kernel how it
       expects to use some mapped or shared memory areas, so that  the	kernel
       can  choose  appropriate	 read-ahead and caching techniques.  This call
       does not influence the semantics of the application (except in the case
       of  MADV_DONTNEED),  but	 may influence its performance.	 The kernel is
       free to ignore the advice.

       The advice is indicated in the advice argument which can be

       MADV_NORMAL
	      No special treatment.  This is the default.

       MADV_RANDOM
	      Expect page references in random order.  (Hence, read ahead  may
	      be less useful than normally.)

       MADV_SEQUENTIAL
	      Expect  page  references	in sequential order.  (Hence, pages in
	      the given range can be aggressively read ahead, and may be freed
	      soon after they are accessed.)

       MADV_WILLNEED
	      Expect  access  in  the near future.  (Hence, it might be a good
	      idea to read some pages ahead.)

       MADV_DONTNEED
	      Do not expect access in the near future.	(For the  time	being,
	      the  application is finished with the given range, so the kernel
	      can free resources associated with it.)  Subsequent accesses  of
	      pages  in this range will succeed, but will result either in re-
	      loading of the memory contents from the underlying  mapped  file
	      (see  mmap(2)) or zero-fill-on-demand pages for mappings without
	      an underlying file.

       MADV_REMOVE (Since Linux 2.6.16)
	      Free up a given range of pages and its associated backing store.
	      Currently,  only	shmfs/tmpfs  supports this; other file systems
	      return with the error ENOSYS.

       MADV_DONTFORK (Since Linux 2.6.16)
	      Do not make the pages in this range available to the child after
	      a	 fork(2).   This  is useful to prevent copy-on-write semantics
	      from changing the physical location of a page(s) if  the	parent
	      writes  to  it  after  a	fork(2).  (Such page relocations cause
	      problems for hardware that DMAs into the page(s).)

       MADV_DOFORK (Since Linux 2.6.16)
	      Undo the effect of MADV_DONTFORK, restoring the  default	behav‐
	      ior, whereby a mapping is inherited across fork(2).

       MADV_DONTDUMP
	      Exclude  from  a core dump those pages in the range specified by
	      addr and length.	This is useful in applications that have large
	      areas  of memory that are known not to be useful in a core dump.
	      The effect of MADV_DONTDUMP takes precedence over the  bit  mask
	      that   is	  set  via  the	 /proc/PID/coredump_filter  file  (see
	      core(5)).

       MADV_DODUMP
	      Undo the effect of an earlier MADV_DONTDUMP.

RETURN VALUE
       On success madvise() returns zero.  On error, it returns -1  and	 errno
       is set appropriately.

ERRORS
       EAGAIN A kernel resource was temporarily unavailable.

       EBADF  The map exists, but the area maps something that isn't a file.

       EINVAL The  value  len is negative, addr is not page-aligned, advice is
	      not a valid value, or the application is attempting  to  release
	      locked or shared pages (with MADV_DONTNEED).

       EIO    (for  MADV_WILLNEED)  Paging  in	this  area  would  exceed  the
	      process's maximum resident set size.

       ENOMEM (for MADV_WILLNEED) Not enough memory: paging in failed.

       ENOMEM Addresses in the specified range are not	currently  mapped,  or
	      are outside the address space of the process.

CONFORMING TO
       POSIX.1b.    POSIX.1-2001  describes  posix_madvise(3)  with  constants
       POSIX_MADV_NORMAL, etc., with a behavior close to that described	 here.
       There is a similar posix_fadvise(2) for file access.

       MADV_REMOVE, MADV_DONTFORK, and MADV_DOFORK are Linux-specific.

NOTES
   Linux Notes
       The current Linux implementation (2.4.0) views this system call more as
       a command than as advice and hence may return an error when  it	cannot
       do  what	 it  usually  would  do	 in response to this advice.  (See the
       ERRORS description above.)  This is non-standard behavior.

       The Linux implementation	 requires  that	 the  address  addr  be	 page-
       aligned,	 and allows length to be zero.	If there are some parts of the
       specified address range that are not mapped, the Linux version of  mad‐
       vise()  ignores	them  and  applies  the	 call to the rest (but returns
       ENOMEM from the system call, as it should).

SEE ALSO
       getrlimit(2), mincore(2), mmap(2), mprotect(2), msync(2), munmap(2)

COLOPHON
       This page is part of release 3.22 of the Linux  man-pages  project.   A
       description  of	the project, and information about reporting bugs, can
       be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.

Linux				  2008-04-22			    MADVISE(2)
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