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Transparent Memory Offloading (TMO)

1 post · Jun 2022

What this trail covers

Meta's Transparent Memory Offloading (TMO) system, in production since 2021, has been successfully integrated into the Linux kernel. TMO automatically adjusts memory offloading to heterogeneous devices like compressed memory or SSDs based on real-time workload pressure metrics (PSI) and device performance. This system has achieved significant memory savings (20-32%) across millions of servers by intelligently migrating colder memory pages, addressing the growing demand for memory in applications like machine learning and the rising cost of DRAM.

All Meta trails
  1. Transparent memory offloading: more memory at a fraction of the cost and powerThis post introduces Meta's Transparent Memory Offloading (TMO) system, a novel Linux kernel mechanism designed to reduce DRAM costs and power consumption by offloading colder memory pages to cheaper storage technologies like SSDs. TMO utilizes Pressure Stall Information (PSI) to measure actual workload impact from memory shortages and a userspace agent called Senpai to dynamically adjust memory reclaim rates. The system intelligently handles diverse workloads and heterogeneous offload devices, and has been successfully upstreamed into the Linux kernel.