Issue

• RFE for a human readable option for free command
• Any chance of adding a -h for a human readable display to the /usr/bin/free utility? Reasons are:
  • a) not obvious at first what units are displayed in, e.g.

# free
             total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:       3924552     386908    3537644          0      68736     167080
-/+ buffers/cache:     151092    3773460
Swap:      6029304          0    6029304

 * b) free doesn't say what the default units are:

# free -h
free: invalid option -- 'h'
usage: free [-b|-k|-m|-g] [-l] [-o] [-t] [-s delay] [-c count] [-V]
  -b,-k,-m,-g show output in bytes, KB, MB, or GB
  -l show detailed low and high memory statistics
  -o use old format (no -/+buffers/cache line)
  -t display total for RAM + swap
  -s update every [delay] seconds
  -c update [count] times
  -V display version information and exit

• Only the man page says what the default unit is, i.e. "The -b switch displays the amount of memory in bytes; the -k switch (set by default) displays it in kilobytes; the -m switch displays it in megabytes."
  • c) Makes it easier to read - I'm not interested in the exact figure, just a rough figure that's more manageable. So example output would be like this (sorry if columns are all over the place):

# free
             total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:       3.9GB     3.8GB    3.5GB          0      67MB     167MB
-/+ buffers/cache:     147MB    3.6GB
Swap:      5.8GB          0    5.8GB

• No changes to the columns/format or the default unit option (keep it as KB for compatibility). Would be nice if available in RHEL 5+.
• Also update the "options" page as shown in b) so show the default KB is indicated.
• The customer requests that we consider adding some human friendly detail to /usr/bin/free. Specifically a -h option to match other gnu utilities and a note in the help text to indicate that the default unit of measurement is in bytes.
• Customer is looking for a a more human friendly output that is easier to read at a glance.
• addition of a -h option to produce results in the highest order of magnitude possible (like other utilities)
• addition of a note in the help text, to make clear that calling the command without options reports in bytes.
• Arguably this detail is available in the man page, but the customer asks we consider it anyway.