From: utzoo!decvax!decwrl!sun!megatest!fortune!sri-unix!smk@Mitre-Bedford
Newsgroups: net.unix-wizards
Title: the -n flag on ld on 4.1bsd
Article-I.D.: sri-unix.3737
Posted: Sun Oct 10 23:04:52 1982
Received: Sun Oct 17 22:36:01 1982

Date: Sun Oct 10 15:29:38 1982
We seem to have a controversy here about the -n flag on ld.  From what
I understand, if the -n flag is NOT used, the text portion of the program is
loaded as needed, but it is NOT shared between users who invoke the same
program.  If the -n flag is used, the text portion is shared (RO) between all
users who invoke it, but the text portion is loaded all at once which slows
down the initialization of the program.  In addition, the sticky bit can only
be used on files that were loaded with the -n flag.
	If programs loaded WITHOUT the -n flag are still shared between users,
what is the need for the -n flag on 4.1 at all?  For backwards compatibility?
For the sticky bit?
	This topic came up because we have at times filled swap space (at
least we would get messages like `table full') and couldn't do a ps without
errors on drum and kmem.  I thought it was due to programs like vaxima and
emacs and other monsters that weren't shared between users and tended to fill
up swap space.
	Am I right or wrong?  There is no real documentation/guidance on this
subject.  I haven't seen such discussions appearing here before.

	--steve kramer