The Linux Memory Manager

by Lorenzo Stoakes

Fall 2025, 1,300 pp.

ISBN-13:

9781718504462

The Linux memory management subsystem hasn’t had a definitive reference since 2004. The Linux Memory Manager fills this void with a modern, in-depth exploration of how Linux handles memory, combining high-level overviews with detailed code analysis.

Written by a Linux kernel maintainer and supported by insights from memory management experts, this book provides readers with a rare opportunity to explore the subsystem at both the conceptual and code levels.

This 1,300-page guide goes beyond surface explanations, showing how core principles are implemented in the Linux kernel source and serving as both a study guide and an on-the-job reference for years to come.

This book targets Linux 6.0.

Author Bio

Lorenzo Stoakes is a Linux kernel maintainer and Consulting Member of the Technical staff at Oracle, working as a core kernel engineer in the memory management subsystem. He is co-maintainer of memory mapping functionality within the kernel, maintaining the code that acts at the intersection between userland memory operations and the kernel. He has been programming professionally for 20 years, most of which has been spent working on low-level and systems development. He has been contributing to the Linux kernel for more than a decade.

Table of contents

Chapter 1: Introduction
Chapter 2: Physical Memory
Chapter 3: Virtual Memory
Chapter 4: Process Memory
Chapter 5: Memory Mapping
Chapter 6: Page Faults
Chapter 7: Reverse Mappings
Chapter 8: Manipulating Userland Memory
Chapter 9: The Page Cache
Chapter 10: Writeback
Chapter 11: Reclaim and Memory Pressure
Chapter 12: Swap Memory
Chapter 13: The Out of Memory (OOM) Killer
Chapter 14: Practical Memory Management

Index

The chapters in red are included in this Early Access PDF.