What does the VIRT memory display mean in the htop utility in Linux, and how does it differ from other memory parameters?

VIRT (virtual memory) in the htop utility shows the total amount of virtual memory allocated to a process. This includes:

• All memory addresses that the process can use (including loaded libraries, allocated but not necessarily used memory)
• Memory mapped to files
• Swap files

Differences from other parameters:

• RES (Resident Set Size) — the amount of physical memory (RAM) actually used by the process at the moment.
• SHR (Shared Memory) — part of RES that can be shared with other processes (e.g., shared libraries).

Thus, VIRT shows the potential size of the process's address space but does not reflect actual RAM consumption.