Re: Relocating/Eliminating HIBERFIL.SYS for WinXP

From: linda w (lindaw_tlinxorg@hotmail.com)
Date: 01/04/03 

Date: Fri, 03 Jan 2003 23:54:56 -0800
From: linda w <lindaw_tlinxorg@hotmail.com>

User preferences ... take a look at the 'Recovery' options for system services.
They have 3 options: First try X, then if that fails, try Y, then if that
fails try Z.

No reason to make it a fixed number -- think of outlook mail filtering/sorting.

There may be a max, but it isn't evident.

First check this condition. If true, then try a second condition, then if true
try a third condition if something fails go to next rule:

Try first condit, ...2nd, 3rd....etc.

So a simple set of options:
1. Pre-reserve filespace on partition "X" as filename "blah"
       or use partition "xyzzy" as a hiber partition --
        a) pre-reserve/format (any change in format or partition type would
                prevent hiberfile from overwriting it)
        b) use partition 'x' overwriting whatever is there (danger will robinson)
2. Don't pre-reserve the space
        a) warn if filespace comes within ([D/H]%/A<unit>) of needed minimum for
hyberfile - issue warning and if under that amount, issue warning on every
reboot or ( |x| don't remind me again). <unit>=(bytes,Kb, Mb, Gb), A=absolute
value, H=% relative to hyberfile, D=% relative to disk.

3. (greyed out if #1 selected with partition overwrite or pre-alloced file) -

        |x| at x% take action [launch program, display alert, beep really loud, play a
song, display a dance...um suspend[force?], shutdown [force], whatever..]
                | | repeat every 'x'% decrease

        Selecting one action will display an active checkbox w/duplicate text
for a 2nd action, selecting it will display a 3rd....etc. etc. etc.

        These are all reused concepts from other programs. If one had access
to MS source, one could simply pull in the parts -- not have to design much
of anything.

        Solving your concerns doesn't rocket science. It's all been done
before.

        As for hybernation reliability -- I thought I'd try timing a hybernate.
it failed. System Error, Hybernate aborted. So much for "reliable" hybernate.
   Will try closing programs...this is lame -- I reserve my 1G+ hyber file and
it doesn't even work...Contingency options are always a good plan...

        Further attempts to hybernate told me hybernate wasn't an option (hyberfile was
present). Only a reboot cured the problem -- sorta defeats the point of
hybernation, wouldn't ya say?

        Hybernate may be faster to boot ~7 seconds vs. 28 on my system, but
if you include the time it took to go into hybernation and the shutdown times,
hybernate took close to 57 seconds while shutdown-reboot took about 50. I know
-- theoretically you wouldn't be waiting on the shutdown time, only the startup
-- but if your hybernate fails (have had it happen with a device not allowing
suspend or hybernate on another system), the ability to have shutdown as a
'backup option' might be prudent.

                
> You miss a few things with your pseudocode though, albeit
> your point is well taken: 

---
	I miss a few things?  I wrote it in minutes, what would you expect?
> 
> Litanys of things like that pop to mind...all because the 
> space isn't reserved.
---
	litany answered above.
> 
> Oh, and about the boot time difference between hibernate 
> vs shutdown, check out all the "how can I make my 
> computer boot faster" posts, not to mention the 1000's of 
> FAQ posts and wonder if that would increase if the 
> machine shutdown because of lack of space vs hibernate.
----
	hey, 7 seconds vs. 28 seconds for startup time...I'm hurtin' over that.
	I've never said anyone should be *forced* to do without a hyberfile.  Whatever 
works best for them.  For me, total trip time is longer on hybernate --- writing 
a gig of memory takes a while (on a laptop disk)...
> 
> Not that I disagree with you, but as a frequent laptop 
> user (with a not-so-fast disk even though it's 20GB), I 
> expect it to hibernate, not suspend or shutdown.
---
	My main machine is a laptop -- using one now -- usually plugged in, and
when it is, I'd rather standby than even suspend since I want automatic tasks 
run at night.
> If the space really bugs people, why do they want to get 
> rid of it if they still want to hibernate?  You'll need 
> the space when you hibernate, so why try to 'clear it up' 
> if you will?
---
	Because maybe I want to burn a CD -- that requires an extra 6-700 meg for a 
temporary file.   Maybe I'd want to work on a large video and want the extra 
'work' space -- not as permanent storage.  Maybe I want to create a multi-gig 
backup file of some dir or partition before I transfer it to another system.  I 
can think of several reasons not to *force* pre-reserving space.  Same with the 
stupid swap mechanism ...
> 
> (Also, why not just set your PF to something like 25 MB 
> on a 1 GB RAM system?)
---
	Try it...you won't like it.  WindowsXP is sorta buggy when it comes to 
pagefiles (what else is new?)  Create a pagefile smaller than it 'likes' and it 
will ignore your preset limits and expand it to the XP default of 1.5xphysmem. 
I've had it happen several times with several settings.  I *wanted* to set a 1Mb 
page file -- on a RAM disk would be ideal, but 1M on a C: quickly gets a message 
that I don't have enough swap and some stupid programmer decided it would be 
good for me to ignore my settings because it would other OS bugs (like claims of
insufficient memory to run a program when you have over 700M free) and 
immediately clicking it a second time correctly starts the program.  My max 
"page usage" is usually under 300.  That means, at most times, I have over 2x my 
normal run memory left over.  Tell me by what stretch of any imagination that 
this is somehow worse that having 300 meg physical and 450 meg in swapfile.  It 
just ain't true by *any* measure -- it's only a cover for buggy/faulty memory
management in the OS.
	Even if I do use a swap -- the OS has another bug -- it swaps programs to make 
room for disk buffers -- even though my memory management selection clearly says 
to favor programs getting memory *over* disk buffers.  Yet even with only 
130-170M of programs space used, XP starts swapping my programs out to disk. 
That's with over 800M "free" (being used as a disk cache that should be flushed 
or freed before my programs get swapped out).
> 
> I don't disagree with you here, but it's not quite as 
> simple as it seems to me.
---
	yes it is.  It's been done before.  It isn't new technology.  The interfaces 
have been coded up in other MS products.  Pry them out of outlook and the 
service restart code...  Unless the different groups aren't allowed to share 
code,  or even within the same company, they have the "not invented here" 
syndrome -- they have tons of usable UI code to draw from.
	Yeah...having to live with crappy bugs that they won't fix unless I pay them 
*again* for "support" (to fix the buggy product they sold to me in the first 
place) does irritate me at times...
linda
--
L. A. Walsh			Trust, Security, and OS Technology
				Professional Newbie in life
Email: Apply "s/@.*$//;s/_/@/;s/x/x./" (sed commands) to my From-address.

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