Absurdly large /proc/kcore file -- what does it mean?

I had to abort a backup of my system because it stalled on the file /proc/kcore. I check its size and, well, the file is enormous. Checking Google, it seems that many other people have absurdly large kcore files as well.

I have three questions:

1. should I be concerned about kcore's size?
2. if so, how can I reduce its size?
3. is there any reason to backup the /proc/ directory?

1 Answer

First things first: /proc is a virtual filesystem. Do not back it up. Its contents do not exist on the disk.

From man 5 proc:

/proc/kcore This file represents the physical memory of the system and is stored in the ELF core file format. With this pseudo-file, and an unstripped kernel (/usr/src/linux/vmlinux) binary, GDB can be used to examine the current state of any kernel data structures. The total length of the file is the size of physical memory (RAM) plus 4KB.

So, I'd be a bit concerned if the kcore is small.

How do you reduce its size? Reduce your RAM.

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