One of the improvements in the upcoming Linux kernel v5.16 is an improvement to the kernel’s memory management functionality, which will reportedly improve the performance of certain workloads by upto 10%.
Dubbed memory folios, the new feature debuted in Linux kernel 5.16-rc1, the first release candidate (RC) of the next version of the Linux kernel, released yesterday by Linus Torvalds, the maintainer of the mainline Linux kernel.
“The multi-page folios offer some improvement to some workloads….Real workloads (eg building the kernel, running postgres in a steady state, etc) seem to benefit between 0-10%,” explained long-time kernel developer, and the author of memory folios, Matthew Wilcox.
