Virtual Address Space

Definitions

1. The range of memory addresses available to a process, mapped by the OS and MMU to physical RAM, swap, or memory-mapped files. Each process gets its own virtual address space (e.g., 48-bit on x86-64, yielding 256 TiB), providing isolation so one process cannot read or corrupt another's memory.

   In plain English: A private, fake view of memory that the operating system gives each program, making it appear as though the program has all the memory to itself.

   Example: "The process thinks it has a contiguous 256 TiB address space, but the MMU is mapping those virtual addresses to scattered physical pages."

Related Terms

• Jemalloc
• Loadable Module
• Memory Arena
• Microkernel
• Paging
• Stack Memory
• Swappiness
• User Space
• Virtual Memory