Re: MySqld processes keeps growing in size

[Harrison Fisk]

Hi,

First thing to note is that MySQL uses threads and not processes. This is very confusing under linux due to the way that it reports the information in top/ps/etc... It makes it look like they are seperate processes, but they aren't really.

With a threaded program like MySQL, all of the memory is shared. That means when you see 20 mysqlds listed with 25 MB listed there, it is only using 25 MB total, not 25*20 = 500 MB.

With that said, it is fairly normal for the memory to grow some while the server is running. Each connection to MySQL will take up a slight bit more memory. It will be at least thread_stack (normally 128K) in size, in addition to all of the thread specific buffers, such as sort_buffer, read_buffer, join_buffer, etc...

If you post the output of SHOW STATUS; and SHOW VARIABLES; it might be easier to see exactly what is going on in your system.

Regards,

Harrison