Which filesystem type is primarily used for swap space and is not intended to be mounted as a normal filesystem?

Which filesystem type is primarily used for swap space and is not intended to be mounted as a normal filesystem?

• A. Ext4
• B. Swap
• C. Tmpfs
• D. Proc

Answer: (B)

Swap space is the kernel’s memory backing store. It is not meant to be accessed like a normal file system; instead the operating system uses it to move pages of memory out of RAM when physical memory is tight. This is managed by the swap subsystem, created with a tool like mkswap and activated with swapon, and it can be a dedicated partition or a swap file. You don’t mount swap, and you don’t read or write files to it in the usual sense; the kernel handles paging to and from this area transparently. Ext4 is a conventional on-disk filesystem designed for persistent storage with directories, files, and permissions. Tmpfs is an in-memory filesystem that is mounted and used like a regular filesystem, though its contents disappear when the system reboots. Proc is a virtual filesystem that exposes kernel and process information. None of these are intended specifically as swap backing store.

Swap space is the kernel’s memory backing store. It is not meant to be accessed like a normal file system; instead the operating system uses it to move pages of memory out of RAM when physical memory is tight. This is managed by the swap subsystem, created with a tool like mkswap and activated with swapon, and it can be a dedicated partition or a swap file. You don’t mount swap, and you don’t read or write files to it in the usual sense; the kernel handles paging to and from this area transparently.

Ext4 is a conventional on-disk filesystem designed for persistent storage with directories, files, and permissions. Tmpfs is an in-memory filesystem that is mounted and used like a regular filesystem, though its contents disappear when the system reboots. Proc is a virtual filesystem that exposes kernel and process information. None of these are intended specifically as swap backing store.