How do you determine the size of main memory available to a program?

Question

I'm studying topics related to virtual memory and memory allocation, but I don't really understand how to know the available memory for a process. How do I determine the amount available; and secondly, is this determined by your operating system's kernel or is there a more architectural reason?

Answer 1

Memory allocated to a process is entirely dependent upon the operating environment, system, architecture, and perhaps even the underlying hardware. Even the literal detail definition of a process is often dependent upon those elements. As a result, there's simply no universal answer to the question.