The ExMap kernel module creates a virtual memory area (VMA) that is not managed by the Linux kernel. This area is shared with a user space application, giving it fast and directly controlled file-mapped I/O or anonymous memory.

Memory operations, such as allocation and freeing, as well as reads and writes, can only be done explicitly by the application using ExMap. With ExMap, there is no OS implicity (like page faults or automatic write-back).

See vmcache for a database buffer manager that uses ExMap.

./load.sh will

1. copy the ExMap header for applications to /usr/include,
2. build and (re-)insert the exmap and memory_pool kernel modules, and
3. insert the null_blk test block device.

Once everything is built and loaded, run ./test-exmap in the eval folder for a basic functionality test.

module contains the main ExMap driver and an adapted version of Linux's mm/memory.c.

memory_pool is a separate general module, used by ExMap, that provides its lock-free memory pool.

For both, a workaround through kallsyms is used in order to get non-exported functions.

Finally, the eval folder contains some basic tests and benchmarks.