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Memory Leak

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by vijay_kar

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Memory not getting refreshed after the process is closed.
Ex;- I have 512MB ram when pc comes up it uses 280MB ram, when i start any app.. it comes to 470MB, when I close that app.. it comes to 400MB. It is not getting refreshed.

3 replies

by cpfeiffe

What tool are you using to determine this? This may be normal. What I mean is that there are blocks of RAM that are loaded as shared and are not always cleaned up when a process exits. If the space is needed by another process it is cleaned up then, but the thought is that the data may need to be accessed again so it is left alone, but marked with some flag that basically says it is OK to overwrite. Therefore, tools like vmstat will show you that you are low on RAM, but you really could start another app without killing your box. You need a tool that can tell you what RAM is fixed and what RAM is not fixed (something like HP's glance or better, not sure what you have in Linux).

by cpfeiffe

I meant to tell you to try this test. You say when you start you are at 280 MB used and then running any app takes you to 470 MB on a 512 MB box. Exiting the app brings you down to 400 MB. It is safe to say then that if you really do have a true memory leak and you try to start another app it will use nearly all of your RAM and maybe start swapping. If the point I'm making holds true then this will not be the case. So try this test -

Boot your linux box. Start an app. Verify used RAM is 470 MB. Stop the app. Verify used RAM is 400MB. Start another app. Your used RAM should stop under 512 MB and you should not be swapping. If you have a memory leak you will definitely be swapping by this point as you will try to use an additional 190 MB on top of the 400 MB you are already using.

by vijay_kar

The problem that Iam facing is, memory is not getting refreshed, which used by the old process.
Is there any tool to refresh the memory.

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