Linux kmalloc

http://www.fiveanddime.net/man-pages/kmalloc.9.html

 

GFP_ATOMIC

tries to allocate the memory immediately. The task will not sleep if the memory isn't available. There is a number of reserved pages for GFP_ATOMIC. For allocating memory on interrupt this has to be used.

GFP_KERNEL

is the normal way to allocate memory in the kernel space. The reserved pages will not be used, and if the memory is not available immediately, try_to_free_page() will be called.