> On 31 Oct 2022, at 09:26, Jan Beulich wrote: > > On 28.10.2022 17:27, George Dunlap wrote: >> On Thu, Oct 27, 2022 at 8:12 AM Jan Beulich wrote: >> >>> On 26.10.2022 21:22, Andrew Cooper wrote: >>>> On 26/10/2022 14:42, Jan Beulich wrote: >>> >> >> >>>> paging isn't a great name. While it's what we call the infrastructure >>>> in x86, it has nothing to do with paging things out to disk (the thing >>>> everyone associates the name with), nor the xenpaging infrastructure >>>> (Xen's version of what OS paging supposedly means). >>> >>> Okay, "paging" can be somewhat misleading. But "p2m" also doesn't fit >>> the use(s) on x86. Yet we'd like to use a name clearly better than the >>> previous (and yet more wrong/misleading) "shadow". I have to admit that >>> I can't think of any other sensible name, and among the ones discussed >>> I still think "paging" is the one coming closest despite the >>> generally different meaning of the word elsewhere. >>> >> >> Inside the world of operating systems / hypervisors, "paging" has always >> meant "things related to a pagetable"; this includes "paging out to disk". >> In fact, the latter already has a perfectly good name -- "swap" (e.g., swap >> file, swappiness, hypervisor swap). >> >> Grep for "paging" inside of Xen. We have the paging lock, paging modes, >> nested paging, and so on. There's absolutely no reason to start thinking >> of "paging" as exclusively meaning "hypervisor swap". > > Just to clarify: You actually support my thinking that "paging" is an okay > term to use here? I ask because, perhaps merely because of not being a > native speaker, to me content and wording suggest different things: The > former appears to support my response to Andrew, while the latter reads to > me as if you were objecting. Sorry, the tone was “objecting” because it was directed mainly at Andrew’s arguments. I thought about replying only to his mail, but it seemed like since I was clearly “joining the discussion”, it would make more sense to quote you too. I could probably have made it more clear by leading with something like, “I tend to agree with Jan here. …” -George