New member here. Thanks for the post, I learned new things. I’ve been confused since I started using btop on my laptop, I don’t understand the difference between free and available.
If I understood you correctly, you’re saying that the difference between Free and Available is that Free is memory that has not been used in the current session. Where as available is memory that is being used as cache and buffers but can be freed at will for new or existing processes to use. Is this correct?
Here’s a list of further questions I have:
- If 4.52 GB is available, doesn’t that mean it is free to use? So then why is there a different field name
Freewhich is 1.14GB? - If caches and buffers are using the available memory then how can it be available?
- If this available memory (4.52 GiB) is taken from the process that owns it without closing the owning process, and given to a new or existing process then wouldn’t that crash the process that was using it?
- If the memory is Free and unused then why is it wasted instead of being memory that can easily be used by a new or existing process since no other process is hoarding it?