http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/item/14045/

[-8 votes] Solution #1: How to do this initially


[3 votes] Solution #2: More elegant solution


]]> en-us Sat, 04 Oct 2008 03:56:55 +0000 Sun, 18 Jan 2009 05:58:07 +0000 QAPoll module http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/14045/ Sat, 04 Oct 2008 07:12:29 +0000 Sat, 04 Oct 2008 14:20:40 +0000
@brattalton check your sources. You allocate the swap file, defrag it once (or ensure its allocated already defragged), and there isn't any fragmentation. The advantage is though, at least the file can expand if you run out of swap file, with a swap partition, stuff will just crash!]]> Sat, 04 Oct 2008 15:34:01 +0000 Sun, 12 Oct 2008 04:43:57 +0000
Allocate a swap file does NOT create "incredible" defragmentation.

Swapping to a file does not create any extra overhead: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paging#Linux

@zooounds, you can hibernate to a swap file. You just need to add "resume_offset" command to kernel options, and this is what this idea is all about.]]> Wed, 03 Dec 2008 05:52:05 +0000 Sun, 07 Dec 2008 07:28:04 +0000 IMHO users should be able to choose at install time between swap file, swap partition or swapless system.

Swap file is as fast as a swap partition.
(http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/7/7/326)
]]> Sun, 14 Dec 2008 00:32:05 +0000 Sun, 21 Dec 2008 01:28:05 +0000
Once again, we have a bunch of elitist linux users arguing incorrect information.

There is no good reason to have this, and if the swap partitions were as great as we all pretend, surely Microsoft and OSX would use them.. ]]> Sun, 21 Dec 2008 03:02:47 +0000 Sun, 21 Dec 2008 03:15:04 +0000 Sun, 21 Dec 2008 14:40:19 +0000 A good reason would be that if I add RAM to my PC and my swap parttion is not big enough, I lose my ability to hibernate the system.

Changing swapfile size is much easier than change partition size, am I correct ?]]> Mon, 22 Dec 2008 16:20:41 +0000
A partition means programs get killed when you run out of swap/ram, but a swapfile lets the system expand the swap available so that nothing dies]]> Mon, 22 Dec 2008 23:22:25 +0000
Swapfile is a very useful feature for my cause. I use MacBookPro with tripple-boot (Mac OSX, Ubuntu, WinXP). Due to various limitations of GRUB, WinXP+BootCamp, MacOSX, EFI, etc, extended partitions cannot be used (can you believe that in 21st century?), so I left with only 4 primary MBR partitions, one of which is taken by EFI/GPT. It leaves no place for a swap partition in the scheme of things on MacBookPro. I did a very easy 5-line prep of a file, and got swap on a file on /.

However, implementers beware! It breaks nice uspalsh boot screen and drops into text mode "Reading files needed to boot..." due to /etc/initramfs-tools/conf.d/resume file content. I found this article that may help to do it properly:
http://www.mjmwired.net/kernel/Documentation/power/swsusp-and-swap-files.txt, however after few hours of trial and error hibernate/resume still does not work and usplash drops out. Usplash is easy to fix by removing "quiet" from kernel boot options. Hibernate seems broken due to a bug (see Ubuntu bug #313724 https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnome-power-manager/+bug/313724).
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