OS/2 Shareware BBS: SysTools/SysTools.zip/swapmon3.zip/SwapMon.txt

Text File | 1997-05-31 | 8KB | 194 lines

SwapMon v3.1 (c)Keith Jones
----------------------------

The Only Swapfile Utility You Need

A word about swapfiles
----------------------
Have you ever noticed your system becoming sluggish and unresponsive,
for no apparent reason? One possible cause is that your initial swap
file size is too small and OS/2 has stepped in to manage it. This will
be a common problem during your early days - the installed default
swapfile size isn't that big. But how do you know how big it should be?
SwapMon is the answer to this question! This small utility will tell
you at a glance if the problem is swap file size and (if it is) how big
it should be.

As you use OS/2 and have SwapMon active you will see that certain
applications will cause the swapfile to grow (Netscape always does it
to me) but if you only use these applications infrequently then there's
no need to increase the swapfile size. SwapMon allows you to watch
what's happening and with this information you will be able to judge
the correct size.

SwapMon will also monitor your swapfile usage and keep this information
across sessions. Using this usage figure will allow it to determine the
best size for your swapfile. Do you really *need* a 100MB swapfile?
After all you might only be using 20MB of it.

Installation
------------
Create a subdirectory for SwapMon to live in and unzip the
SwapMOn.zip archive into it. Run install.cmd in this subdirectory and
SwapMon will be installed onto your desktop.

SwapMon uses its own device driver, which will be installed when you
run install.cmd. Because of this you will need to restart OS/2 for the
changes to take place.

If you have previously installed any version of SwapMon 2 then you will
have to remove the device line for THESEUS2.SYS from your CONFIG.SYS

Usage
-----
In use SwapMon displays three figures. The first is the initial size of
your swap file, as given in the SWAPPATH setting in your config.sys.
The second is the current size of your swap file. Depending on your
settings then if the current size is larger all information displayed
will be in red, otherwise it'll be in black. The final figure is the
size of your swapfile which is actually in use.

If your swapfile is currently larger than it's initial setting then
you need to consider increasing the initial size of your swap file.
This can be done by editing your config.sys (or you can let SwapMon do
this - see the section headed 'Menus'). Find the line which says:

SWAPPATH=E:\OS2\SYSTEM 2048 2048

(your numbers and location may not be the same). You need to change the
last number. So, suppose that SwapMon was saying that the current swap
file was 7168 you would need to change the last figure. Using the line
shown above it would become:

SWAPPATH=E:\OS2\SYSTEM 2048 7168

Save your new config.sys, shutdown and reboot. Your system performance
should now improve!

You should also see the Menu item "Statistics Show" in the next
section. In fact, here it is....

Menus
-----
SwapMon has the following menu options:

File (Alt F)
----
Setup (Alt S) - this will bring up a dialog which will allow you to set
the alarm method to visual (turns the information displayed to red if
your current swapfile exceeds its initial value) and audable
(irritating one second beep if the current swapfile exceeds its initial
value). You can also set the interval between checks of current
swapfile size (a value between 1 second and 5 minutes is possible). The
default button will set the alarm to visual and the interval to 5
seconds.

Statistics Show (Alt O) - this will show the accumulated data which
SwapMon keeps. Based upon your maximum swapfile usage SwapMon will make
an educated guess on what your swapfile size should be and will display
this suggestion. If you click on OK then it will make a backup copy of
CONFIG.SYS (called config.swm) and write a new CONFIG.SYS with the
initial value set to the suggested swapfile size. Please note that the
increase will not take effect until you've shutdown and rebooted.

Statistics Reset (Alt R) - this will reset the accumulated statistics
to the current swapfile size and the current usage. Of course it'll ask
for confirmation before it does this.

Exit (Alt X) - ummmm. Exits?

Help (Alt H)
----
About (Alt A) - displays a small dialog which tells you the current
version and how to contact me.


History
-------

v0.1 so bare as to be useless. Never released although a certain
magazine was offered a copy. Nothing happened.

v1.0 first general release.

v1.1 bug fix.

v2.0 SwapMon gets usefull.

v2.01 bugette fixette.

v2.02 Uppercasing in CONFIG.SYS stopped (thanks Raul Barragan!).

v2.03 Slider not displaying on 800x600 fixed (Raul Barragan again)

v2.04 All dialogs altered to display at all resolutions.

v2.1 Statistics reset menu option added (Raul Barragan). Statistics
submenu created. Key shortcuts added.

v2.2 Restore screen position between runs added (Gary M. Svejkovsky)

v3.0 Dropped THESEUS2 support and added own device driver.

v3.1 Minor bug fix.

Finally
------

If you've got this archive from somewhere other than
http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~kjones/ then you should check there
to ensure that you've got the most up to date version. The latest
version is displayed on the home page and at the top of this
document.

SwapMon is freeware, but the copyright's mine. I accept no
responsibility for any damage which you or SwapMon may do by editing
your config.sys (you do keep backups, don't you?).

The icon used by SwapMon is taken from David Edwards collection. This
is in a zip file called iconde.zip and is a great help for anyone who's
totally useless with this sort of thing! Thanks David.

If you wish to contact me with comments or suggestion then email me at
[e-mail]

If you need to inform me of a problem then please include as much
information as you can. "It doesn't work" won't help and all that'll
happen is we'll get into a twenty questions session. v1.1 came about
because of a bug which caused to calculations to go wrong. Here's an
extract from the mail message I received from Steve Campisano:

<snip>
SC>There seems to be a problem though and I'm sure it's more than
SC>likely on my end.

SC>The SwapMon values (in RED) are: Initial 92160k, Current 4194301k.

SC>My CONFIG.SYS entry is: SWAPPATH=E:\ 2048 92160.

SC>The hard drive that the above swap file is located on is a 402 meg
SC>separate physical unit from the 2 gig drive I boot Warp off of.
SC>This 402 meg drive is broken down into a number of logical drives
SC>and is mapped in the following manner (info from Partition Magic):
<snip>

I hold this up as an example of how to report a bug. He's gave me all
the information I needed to track down the problem and fix it. If you
need to report a bug (and I don't just mean for this prpgram) then
that's the way to do it. Thanks Steve


Dedication
----------

In the history of SwapMon there are two people which I would like to
single out for special thanks. The first is Peter Fitzsimmons who is
the President of A:WARE Inc in Toronto. Without his help I wouldn't
have been able to write the device driver. The second is Raul Barragan
who is the official SwapMon beta tester. He's shown extreme patience in
the face of my constant changes and has offered invaluable advice
during SwapMon's development.


Keith Jones 30th May 1997