Possible Memory Leak with Fedora 9 64-bit?

On Thu, 26 Jun 2008 00:59:36 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:

> On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 18:01:55 -0500, General Schvantzkopf wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 21:48:58 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:
>>
>>> Anyone experiencing what appears to be a memory leak with Fedora 9 64-
>>> bit? System is unusable--keyboard unresponsive and cursor barely so,
>>> all apps frozen. There is continuous hard drive activity. The only
>>> way to get out of it is hitting the Reset button.
>>>
>>> This happens every few days (I run the system 24/7) with only these
>>> apps running: 2 tabbed shells, file manager, and Firefox 3. I'm
>>> thinking that Firefox is the problem. Years ago, I had similar
>>> behavior with it, in addition to it just totally crashing, but this
>>> hasn't happen for a long time.
>>>
>>> I've taken to quitting Firefox when I go to bed, but leave it running
>>> during the day. So far, the problem has only been occurring when
>>> Firefox is running.
>>>
>>> After rebooting, logs don't show anything out of the ordinary. The
>>> swap is empty.
>>>
>>> Anyone got ideas?
>>>
>>>
>>> Stef
>>
>> Run gnome-system-monitor as well so that you can see what's using up
>> your memory.
>
> Currently, I'm running htop, but having another monitor running on
> another workspace might help: When the system freezes, I can't switch
> workspaces or anything; the keyboard is unresponsive. Wish I could find
> a system monitor that writes a log to disk.
>
> FWIW, the "failure" has never occurred while I was actually using the
> system. It has happened a couple times when left running overnight, and
> a couple of times when I walked away to do something else.
>
> Stef

Just redirect the output to a file

top >& log

On Wed, 25 Jun 2008 21:55:22 -0500, General Schvantzkopf wrote:

> On Thu, 26 Jun 2008 00:59:36 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 18:01:55 -0500, General Schvantzkopf wrote:
>>
>>> On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 21:48:58 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:
>>>
>>>> Anyone experiencing what appears to be a memory leak with Fedora 9
>>>> 64- bit? System is unusable--keyboard unresponsive and cursor barely
>>>> so, all apps frozen. There is continuous hard drive activity. The
>>>> only way to get out of it is hitting the Reset button.
>>>>
>>>> This happens every few days (I run the system 24/7) with only these
>>>> apps running: 2 tabbed shells, file manager, and Firefox 3. I'm
>>>> thinking that Firefox is the problem. Years ago, I had similar
>>>> behavior with it, in addition to it just totally crashing, but this
>>>> hasn't happen for a long time.
>>>>
>>>> I've taken to quitting Firefox when I go to bed, but leave it running
>>>> during the day. So far, the problem has only been occurring when
>>>> Firefox is running.
>>>>
>>>> After rebooting, logs don't show anything out of the ordinary. The
>>>> swap is empty.
>>>>
>>>> Anyone got ideas?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Stef
>>>
>>> Run gnome-system-monitor as well so that you can see what's using up
>>> your memory.
>>
>> Currently, I'm running htop, but having another monitor running on
>> another workspace might help: When the system freezes, I can't switch
>> workspaces or anything; the keyboard is unresponsive. Wish I could
>> find a system monitor that writes a log to disk.
>>
>> FWIW, the "failure" has never occurred while I was actually using the
>> system. It has happened a couple times when left running overnight,
>> and a couple of times when I walked away to do something else.
>>
>> Stef
>
> Just redirect the output to a file
>
> top >& log

Tried that with htop, but the log is unreadable what with formatting
codes, boxy looking symbols, etc. intermixed with the data. Plus, all
new writes to the file are appended to instead of overwriting the old
file. So, the file grows increasingly larger with each write. Left
running continuously, as I would need to do, this would eventually fill
all available space on the partition.

Tried the same thing with top, and although the data is more readable--
less formatting, it appends, too. I need to find a monitor that can
write a log, and can be set to overwrite instead of append. Maybe, I'll
just have to write one myself.

Thanks anyway for the suggestion.

Stef

I demand that Stefan Patric may or may not have written...

[snip]
> Currently, I'm running htop, but having another monitor running on
> another workspace might help: When the system freezes, I can't switch
> workspaces or anything; the keyboard is unresponsive. Wish I could find a
> system monitor that writes a log to disk.

Just in case it's something kernel-related:
http://www.mjmwired.net/kernel/Docum...netconsole.txt

[snip]
--
| Darren Salt | linux or ds at | nr. Ashington, | Toon
| RISC OS, Linux | youmustbejoking,demon,co,uk | Northumberland | Army
| + Output less CO2 => avoid boiling weather. TIME IS RUNNING OUT *FAST*.

Procrastination means never having to say you're sorry.

On Thu, 26 Jun 2008 18:17:35 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:

> On Wed, 25 Jun 2008 21:55:22 -0500, General Schvantzkopf wrote:
>
>> On Thu, 26 Jun 2008 00:59:36 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:
>>
>>> On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 18:01:55 -0500, General Schvantzkopf wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 21:48:58 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Anyone experiencing what appears to be a memory leak with Fedora 9
>>>>> 64- bit? System is unusable--keyboard unresponsive and cursor
>>>>> barely so, all apps frozen. There is continuous hard drive
>>>>> activity. The only way to get out of it is hitting the Reset
>>>>> button.
>>>>>
>>>>> This happens every few days (I run the system 24/7) with only these
>>>>> apps running: 2 tabbed shells, file manager, and Firefox 3. I'm
>>>>> thinking that Firefox is the problem. Years ago, I had similar
>>>>> behavior with it, in addition to it just totally crashing, but this
>>>>> hasn't happen for a long time.
>>>>>
>>>>> I've taken to quitting Firefox when I go to bed, but leave it
>>>>> running during the day. So far, the problem has only been occurring
>>>>> when Firefox is running.
>>>>>
>>>>> After rebooting, logs don't show anything out of the ordinary. The
>>>>> swap is empty.
>>>>>
>>>>> Anyone got ideas?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Stef
>>>>
>>>> Run gnome-system-monitor as well so that you can see what's using up
>>>> your memory.
>>>
>>> Currently, I'm running htop, but having another monitor running on
>>> another workspace might help: When the system freezes, I can't switch
>>> workspaces or anything; the keyboard is unresponsive. Wish I could
>>> find a system monitor that writes a log to disk.
>>>
>>> FWIW, the "failure" has never occurred while I was actually using the
>>> system. It has happened a couple times when left running overnight,
>>> and a couple of times when I walked away to do something else.
>>>
>>> Stef
>>
>> Just redirect the output to a file
>>
>> top >& log
>
> Tried that with htop, but the log is unreadable what with formatting
> codes, boxy looking symbols, etc. intermixed with the data. Plus, all
> new writes to the file are appended to instead of overwriting the old
> file. So, the file grows increasingly larger with each write. Left
> running continuously, as I would need to do, this would eventually fill
> all available space on the partition.
>
> Tried the same thing with top, and although the data is more readable--
> less formatting, it appends, too. I need to find a monitor that can
> write a log, and can be set to overwrite instead of append. Maybe, I'll
> just have to write one myself.
>
> Thanks anyway for the suggestion.
>
> Stef

top seems to update once every few seconds so concatenating it shouldn't
be a problem. I just ran it for a minute and the log was 57K so that's
about 3.5M per hour. If you run it for 30 hours that's still only 100MB.
After your crash you can do a tail on the log file and you'll see what
the last top results were.

On Thu, 26 Jun 2008 13:34:42 -0500, General Schvantzkopf wrote:

> On Thu, 26 Jun 2008 18:17:35 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:
>
>> On Wed, 25 Jun 2008 21:55:22 -0500, General Schvantzkopf wrote:
>>
>>> On Thu, 26 Jun 2008 00:59:36 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 18:01:55 -0500, General Schvantzkopf wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On Tue, 24 Jun 2008 21:48:58 +0000, Stefan Patric wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Anyone experiencing what appears to be a memory leak with Fedora 9
>>>>>> 64- bit? System is unusable--keyboard unresponsive and cursor
>>>>>> barely so, all apps frozen. There is continuous hard drive
>>>>>> activity. The only way to get out of it is hitting the Reset
>>>>>> button.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> This happens every few days (I run the system 24/7) with only these
>>>>>> apps running: 2 tabbed shells, file manager, and Firefox 3. I'm
>>>>>> thinking that Firefox is the problem. Years ago, I had similar
>>>>>> behavior with it, in addition to it just totally crashing, but this
>>>>>> hasn't happen for a long time.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I've taken to quitting Firefox when I go to bed, but leave it
>>>>>> running during the day. So far, the problem has only been
>>>>>> occurring when Firefox is running.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> After rebooting, logs don't show anything out of the ordinary. The
>>>>>> swap is empty.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Anyone got ideas?
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Stef
>>>>>
>>>>> Run gnome-system-monitor as well so that you can see what's using up
>>>>> your memory.
>>>>
>>>> Currently, I'm running htop, but having another monitor running on
>>>> another workspace might help: When the system freezes, I can't
>>>> switch workspaces or anything; the keyboard is unresponsive. Wish I
>>>> could find a system monitor that writes a log to disk.
>>>>
>>>> FWIW, the "failure" has never occurred while I was actually using the
>>>> system. It has happened a couple times when left running overnight,
>>>> and a couple of times when I walked away to do something else.
>>>>
>>>> Stef
>>>
>>> Just redirect the output to a file
>>>
>>> top >& log
>>
>> Tried that with htop, but the log is unreadable what with formatting
>> codes, boxy looking symbols, etc. intermixed with the data. Plus, all
>> new writes to the file are appended to instead of overwriting the old
>> file. So, the file grows increasingly larger with each write. Left
>> running continuously, as I would need to do, this would eventually fill
>> all available space on the partition.
>>
>> Tried the same thing with top, and although the data is more readable--
>> less formatting, it appends, too. I need to find a monitor that can
>> write a log, and can be set to overwrite instead of append. Maybe,
>> I'll just have to write one myself.
>>
>> Thanks anyway for the suggestion.
>>
>> Stef
>
> top seems to update once every few seconds so concatenating it shouldn't
> be a problem. I just ran it for a minute and the log was 57K so that's
> about 3.5M per hour. If you run it for 30 hours that's still only 100MB.
> After your crash you can do a tail on the log file and you'll see what
> the last top results were.

That would work; however, in the 8 weeks or so since I installed Fedora 9
64-bit, the problem has only reared its ugly head 4 or 5 times, and it
doesn't occur regularly. Sometimes, it takes a couple of weeks, but I've
had it happen twice in 24 hours just in the past week. So, based on your
test file sizes, two weeks of running (336 hours) would generate a file
of 33.6GB. Well, /home does have 47GB of free space available. ;-)
Maybe, I could write a cron script to delete the old log and restart top
every 24 hours or so. That would make for a more reasonable file size.

I'm beginning to think that this isn't a memory leak at all, but an
errant, perhaps buggy, process related to Firefox that flips out every
once-in-a-while and eats RAM or CPU cycles or both. If it were a leak,
failure would occur on a fairly regular basis. Plus, I would be able to
see memory slowly, but steadily being used up when the system is
basically idle. I don't see that. I do know that those running 32-bit
Fedora 9 and Firefox have not had this problem at all, even with the
betas.

I need to find someone running 64-bit and see if they are having similar
problems. This could be a problem with just my system.


Stef

On Thu, 26 Jun 2008 19:24:27 +0100, Darren Salt wrote:

> I demand that Stefan Patric may or may not have written...
>
> [snip]
>> Currently, I'm running htop, but having another monitor running on
>> another workspace might help: When the system freezes, I can't switch
>> workspaces or anything; the keyboard is unresponsive. Wish I could
>> find a system monitor that writes a log to disk.
>
> Just in case it's something kernel-related:
> http://www.mjmwired.net/kernel/Docum...netconsole.txt
>
> [snip]

I don't think it's kernel related. Only seems to occur when Firefox is
running. But thanks for the link: It's never disadvantageous to know
more.

Stef