OOM killer
The OOM killer exists because the Linux kernel, by default, can commit to supplying more memory than it can actually provide. Overcommitting memory in this way allows the kernel to make fuller use of the system's resources, because processes typically do not use all of the memory they claim. As an example, consider the fork() system call, which copies all of a process's memory for the new child process. In fact, all it does is to mark the memory as "copy on write" and allow parent and child to share it. Should either change a page shared in this way, a true copy is made. In theory, the kernel could be called upon to copy all of the copy-on-write memory in this way; in practice, that does not happen. If the kernel reserved all of the necessary virtual memory (which includes swap space), some of that space would certainly go unused. Rather than waste that space - and fail to run programs or memory allocations that, in practice, it could have handled - the kernel overcommits itself and hopes for the best.
When the best does not happen, the OOM killer comes into play; its job is to kill processes and free up some memory. Getting it to kill the right processes has been an ongoing challenge, however. One person's useless memory hog is another's crucial application. Thus, over the years, numerous efforts have been made to refine the OOM killer's heuristics, and patches like "oom_pardon" have been created.
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