Multiple addresses translate to a single physical address
ID: x86-paging/multiple-addresses-translate-to-a-single-physical-address
x86 Paging Tutorial Multiple addresses translate to a single physical address by
Ciro Santilli 37 Updated 2025-07-16
The same linear address can translate to different physical addresses for different processes, depending only on the value inside
cr3.Both linear addresses
00002 000 from process 1 and 00004 000 from process 2 point to the same physical address 00003 000. This is completely allowed by the hardware, and it is up to the operating system to handle such cases.This often in normal operation because of Copy-on-write (COW), which be explained elsewhere.
Such mappings are sometime called "aliases".
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