All of us know that Ghost runs on Node.js. When we choose a 1 GB VPS from Digitalocean, the VPS will get stuck because of its RAM usage. But here is the solution: We have to create a swap partition on the server.
What is a swap?
Swap space is the area of a hard disk. It is a part of your machine’s virtual memory, which is a combination of accessible physical memory (RAM) and the swap space. Swap holds memory pages that are temporarily inactive. Swap space is used when your operating system needs physical memory for active processes but there isn’t enough physical memory available (that is, not being used). When this happens, inactive pages from the physical memory are then moved into the swap space, freeing up that physical memory for other uses. Note that the access time for a swap is slower, depending on the speed of the hard drive. It is not a complete replacement for physical memory. Swap space can be a dedicated swap partition, a swap file, or a combination of swap partitions and swap file(s).
Step 1: Swap Information Check-up
The size of swap space depends on the system’s RAM. So, it’s important to make sure your system has enough swap space before making one. Type the below command to check if the system has any swap configured:
$ sudo swapon--show
Step 2: Hard Drive Partition Availability Check-up
Similar to checking the system availability, now let’s check our current disk usage to ensure that we have enough space. Use the df command to check the hard disk partition availability:
df -h
Step 3: Create a Swap File
To create a swap file on our filesystem, allocate a file name as a swapfile in the root (/) directory using the fallocate program. Allocating a file size depends on your needs. To keep the tutorial simple, and easy to understand, we’re creating a 1G file and dedicating 1G of RAM. Use the sudo command to create a swap file:
sudo fallocate -l 1G /swapfile
Step 4: Enable the Swap File
Once we have the correct size available, let’s convert it into swap space. For security reasons, it is crucial to make our file accessible to root users and prevent accessibility from normal users. We’ll add restrictions so that users with root privileges can view the file and read its contents. Use the following root command to make the file only accessible to root users:
sudo chmod 600 /swapfile
Step 5: Make the Swap File Permanent
By default, the server will not retain the swap settings automatically whenever we reboot. To change the default settings and play on the safe side, we will add the swap file to our /etc/fstab file. Use the sudo command to back up the /etc/fstab file:
sudo cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.bak
Step 6: Swap Settings Modification
In this step, we’ll configure the settings and make some modifications. Let’s adjust the swappiness property and change the change cache pressure.
Adjust the Swappiness Property
The swappiness parameter is a tunable kernel parameter. It changes the balance between swapping out runtime memory and accounts for the exchange of data between swaps data out of RAM to the swap space. This parametric value is expressed in percentage, ranging from 0 up to 100.
The vm.swappiness value has a direct influence on the behaviour of system swappiness. The higher the vm.swappiness, the more the system will swap and vice-versa. If the value is close to zero, the kernel will not swap data which may lead to a reduction in performance. Permitting your system not to depend much on the swap is an excellent way to enhance its performance and gain robust responsiveness.
Alternatively, vm.swappiness that is closer towards 100 attempts to put more data in the swap and less on the physical memory. Unlike the low-to-mediocre vm.swappiness value, the high system swapping has very undesirable effects when there are loads of data being swapped actively in-and-out of the RAM.
Check the current swappiness value by typing:
cat /proc/sys/vm/swappiness
You can also set the swappiness of your choice using the sysctl command. Let’s set the swappiness value to 15 by typing:
sudo sysctl vm.swappiness = 15
Until the system is rebooted, the settings will remain as is. Add the line to our /etc/sysctl.conf file to set the value automatic at restart/reboot:
sudo nano /etc/sysctl.conf
At the bottom, insert a line indicating the new value you created:
Vm.swappiness = 15
Adjust the Cache Pressure
Next, we are going to modify vfs_cache_pressure that will take care of inode and dentry information over other data. These vfs_cache_pressure 1 settings 1 also control the tendency of the kernel to reclaim the memory used for caching of the directory. Navigate the proc filesystem again to check the current value:
cat /proc/sys/vm/vfs_cache_pressure
As the configuration is already done, our system will eliminate the inode information from the cache. Let’s set the sysctl vm.vfs_cache_pressure to a more stable setting like this:
sudo sysctl vm.vfs_cache_pressure = 60
Similar to what we did in our swappiness setting, we can change the configuration here as well:
sudo nano /etc/sysctl.conf
At the bottom, insert a line indicating the new value you created:
Vm.vfs_cache_pressure = 60
Finally, save and close the file.
Conclusion
You can add swap space as a dedicated swap partition, a swap file, or a combination of both. You can create swap space and leverage its benefits to run applications seamlessly without much worrying about out-of-memory warnings. While creating swap space is an added advantage in systems with limited memory space, it must not be treated as an alternative for more RAM space. Remember, swap space is located on a hard disk therefore you may experience a slightly slow access time compared to physical memory.
Thanks me later for saving your server cost. 😉