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mkswap — set up a Linux swap area
mkswap [options] device
[size]
mkswap sets up a Linux swap area on a device or in a file.
The device
argument will usually be a disk partition (something like
/dev/sdb7) but can also be a
file. The Linux kernel does not look at partition IDs, but
many installation scripts will assume that partitions of hex
type 82 (LINUX_SWAP) are meant to be swap partitions.
(Warning: Solaris also uses this
type. Be careful not to killyour Solaris
partitions.)
The size parameter
is superfluous but retained for backwards compatibility. (It
specifies the desired size of the swap area in 1024-byte
blocks. mkswap
will use the entire partition or file if it is omitted.
Specifying it is unwise -- a typo may destroy your disk.)
After creating the swap area, you need the swapon command to start
using it. Usually swap areas are listed in /etc/fstab so that they can be taken into
use at boot time by a swapon
-a command in some boot script.
The swap header does not touch the first block. A boot loader or disk label can be there, but it is not a recommended setup. The recommended setup is to use a separate partition for a Linux swap area.
mkswap, like many others mkfs-like utils, erases the first partition block to make any previous filesystem invisible.
However, mkswap refuses to erase the first block on a device with a disk label (SUN, BSD, ...).
−c,
−−checkCheck the device (if it is a block device) for bad blocks before creating the swap area. If any bad blocks are found, the count is printed.
−f,
−−forceGo ahead even if the command is stupid. This allows the creation of a swap area larger than the file or partition it resides on.
Also, without this option, mkswap will refuse to erase the first block on a device with a partition table.
−L,
−−label labelSpecify a label for the device, to allow swapon by label.
−p,
−−pagesize sizeSpecify the page size (in bytes) to use.
This option is usually unnecessary; mkswap reads the size
from the kernel.
−U,
−−uuid UUIDSpecify the UUID to
use. The default is to generate a UUID.
−v,
−−swapversion 1Specify the swap-space version. (This option is
currently pointless, as the old −v 0 option has become obsolete
and now only −v 1 is
supported. The kernel has not supported v0 swap-space
format since 2.5.22 (June 2002). The new version v1 is
supported since 2.1.117 (August 1998).)
−h,
−−helpDisplay help text and exit.
−V,
−−versionDisplay version information and exit.
The maximum useful size of a swap area depends on the architecture and the kernel version. It is roughly 2GiB on i386, PPC, m68k and ARM, 1GiB on sparc, 512MiB on mips, 128GiB on alpha, and 3TiB on sparc64. For kernels after 2.3.3 (May 1999) there is no such limitation.
The maximum number of the pages that is possible to address by swap area header is 4294967295 (UINT_MAX). The remaining space on the swap device is ignored.
Note that before version 2.1.117 the kernel allocated one byte for each page, while it now allocates two bytes, so that taking into use a swap area of 2 GiB might require 2 MiB of kernel memory.
Presently, Linux allows 32 swap areas (this was 8 before
Linux 2.4.10 (Sep 2001)). The areas in use can be seen in the
file /proc/swaps (since 2.1.25
(Sep 1997)).
mkswap refuses areas smaller than 10 pages.
If you don't know the page size that your machine uses, you may be able to look it up with "cat /proc/cpuinfo" (or you may not -- the contents of this file depend on architecture and kernel version).
To set up a swap file, it is necessary to create that file before initializing it with mkswap, e.g. using a command like
# fallocate --length 8GiB swapfile
Note that a swap file must not contain any holes (so, using cp(1) to create the file is not acceptable).