Re: [gentoo-user] Re: /var/tmp on tmpfs

[Rich Freeman]

On Thu, Feb 8, 2018 at 12:47 PM, Nikos Chantziaras <realnc@×××××.com> wrote:
> On 08/02/18 19:11, gevisz wrote:
>>
>> I never used tmpfs for portage TMPDIR before and now decided to give it a
>> try.
>>
>> I have 8GB of RAM and 12GB of swap on a separate partition.
>>

You can try it, but for Chromium these days you might find that still
doesn't perform great.  I have 16GB of RAM (no swap) and have moved
back to building on SSD for that one package (with ccache to help).

>
>
> If you're not using ccache, then you don't need /var/tmp to be on tmpfs. You
> should only put /var/tmp/portage on tmpfs.

I disagree on this.  Unless you have something that uses gobs of space
on /var/tmp there is little reason not to make the whole thing a
tmpfs.

> If you do use ccache, then you need to mount both /var/tmp and
> /var/tmp/portage as tmpfs.

I DEFINITELY disagree on this one.  What is the point of using ccache
and then storing it on tmpfs, unless it is just for dealing with
short-term build failures?  The whole point of ccache is to re-use the
results of previous builds, and sticking it on tmpfs defeats that.  If
you're going to just store it on tmpfs you might as well not use
ccache at all and free up a ton of RAM for the rest of the build.

Maybe I could see this sort of thing being used in niche situations,
such as if you are a developer on some project and build the same
thing 20 times per day between reboots.  If you only build a package
once per reboot then having a ccache on tmpfs provides no benefit at
all, and just eats vram and creates more swap writes (though probably
not reads).

-- 
Rich