From: Erik Heinz (pih@rz.uni-jena.de)
Date: 02/24/93


From: pih@rz.uni-jena.de (Erik Heinz)
Subject: Linux lockup on "out of memory"
Date: 24 Feb 1993 20:03:35 GMT

Hi out there,
sorry, somewhat garbled my last posting, therefore I repeat it here:
My trials to compile larger X applications, like xv2.21, ended in a lockup
of Linux. The last I saw was "out of memory", after this the system would
accept no keystrokes except switching of VCs and - finally - RESET.
Fortunately the file system was not damaged though I made several trials
and could never give a 'sync'. Using 'top' on another VC I could observe
the compiling process taking more and more memory and CPU time. Then the
other VCs worked slowly and finally froze.
Installing a 8MB swap file did not help, it did only lengthen the time
before lockup. Saving memory by desactivating -O did not help, either.

My configuration:
486DX/33, 8MB, Linux 0.99pl5, libc4.3, GCC 2.3.3
no processes running except the compiling and the gettys

My questions:
- Could I have done something wrong, or is it a bug?
- Should I in principle be able to compile larger applications with 8MB RAM
  or should I think abour buying some more SIMMs?

  Thanks in advance
  Erik Heinz (pih@rz.uni-Jena.de)