Abstract:
Canonical is making an important optimization for the upcoming Ubuntu 26.10 desktop version, hoping to improve the stability of the system when memory resources are exhausted. This adjustment will focus on modifying Ubuntu's long-term out-of-memory handling strategy, allowing the system to more reasonably decide which programs should be terminated under extreme memory pressure, thereby avoiding a sudden collapse of the desktop environment.
For a long time, when the Linux system runs out of memory, the kernel will activate the OOM (Out Of Memory) mechanism to release resources by terminating some processes to ensure that the system continues to run. However, in actual use, this mechanism sometimes produces undesirable results. Some key services that maintain the normal functioning of the desktop environment, such as GNOME Shell or D-Bus, may be terminated unexpectedly under high memory pressure, while applications that really consume a lot of resources continue to run, eventually causing the entire graphical interface to become unusable or even exit directly.
To solve this problem, the Ubuntu development team decided to adjust the default policy. The new scheme will give critical desktop services a higher survival priority by lowering their OOM scores, making these components less likely to be included in the cleanup list when the kernel chooses to terminate the target.
At the same time, ordinary applications and background services continue to maintain high default ratings. This means that when the system memory is severely low, browsers, editors or other running applications are more likely to be shut down first, while the core services that support the operation of the desktop environment will be protected.
Ubuntu also plans to disable systemd-oomd's automatic termination policy for entire user sessions. The development team pointed out that systemd-oomd and the Linux kernel OOM mechanism use different decision-making logic, and they do not completely follow the same priority system. Therefore, in some cases, even if a critical desktop service has been set to a higher protection level, systemd-oomd may still terminate it based solely on memory pressure, causing the user session to end abnormally.
Canonical emphasizes that this adjustment does not mean that Ubuntu can completely avoid memory exhaustion problems. When the system does not have enough free memory, some applications will still be closed. The purpose of this optimization is not to make the system immune to OOM events, but to preserve an operable and recoverable desktop environment as much as possible when insufficient resources cannot be avoided.
The development team says the current tweak is just the first step in improving desktop stability. In future versions, Ubuntu also plans to further refine the priority system for different types of services and applications, so that the system can more accurately determine which processes are critical components and which are resources that can be released first.
Relevant changes have been included in the Ubuntu 26.10 development version "Stonking Stingray" and are expected to be released together with the official version. Canonical also calls on developers and test users to verify the new mechanism, especially in scenarios where low-memory devices, high-load operating environments, and a large number of programs are running simultaneously, to help the team collect feedback and continue to optimize.
As modern browsers, development tools, and artificial intelligence applications continue to increase their memory requirements, it is becoming increasingly important for desktop operating systems to maintain stable operation when resources are extremely tight. Although this adjustment will not bring significant interface changes, for Linux users who often run a large number of tasks at the same time, the actual experience improvement may be quite obvious.
Learn more:
https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/improving-ubuntu-desktop-stability-under-memory-pressure/87945
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