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Does Lion Have a Memory Leak?

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  Does Lion Have a Memory Leak? csampson@inetworld.net (Charles H. Sampson) - 2014-05-20 23:13 -0700
    Re: Does Lion Have a Memory Leak? Kevin McMurtrie <mcmurtrie@pixelmemory.us> - 2014-05-21 00:07 -0700
      Re: Does Lion Have a Memory Leak? csampson@inetworld.net (Charles H. Sampson) - 2014-05-21 23:50 -0700
    Re: Does Lion Have a Memory Leak? Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> - 2014-05-21 15:38 +0000
      Re: Does Lion Have a Memory Leak? csampson@inetworld.net (Charles H. Sampson) - 2014-05-21 23:50 -0700
        Re: Does Lion Have a Memory Leak? Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> - 2014-05-22 15:41 +0000
          Re: Does Lion Have a Memory Leak? csampson@inetworld.net (Charles H. Sampson) - 2014-05-23 06:56 -0700
            Re: Does Lion Have a Memory Leak? Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> - 2014-05-23 16:14 +0000

#59566 — Does Lion Have a Memory Leak?

     Does Lion have a memory leak? I have a one-year old MacBook Pro
that came with Lion. It has three users and most of the time all of them
are logged on. This is not an issue with Unix, which I used for years
professionally, and it's not an issue with my old G4 that runs Tiger.
(Yes, the G4 runs slowly but it's not affected by the number of users
logged on. If a user is running a compute hog, that's another story.)

     Every once in a while, at least once a week it seems, the MacBook
runs glacially slow. The only fix that I've discovered so far is to log
everybody off and restart. Then all is good, at least for a while.

                        Charlie
-- 
Nobody in this country got rich on his own.  You built a factory--good.
But you moved your goods on roads we all paid for.  You hired workers we
all paid to educate. So keep a big hunk of the money from your factory.
But take a hunk and pay it forward.  Elizabeth Warren (paraphrased)

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#59571

In article <1llyw85.1g45m681kq3joiN%csampson@inetworld.net>,
 csampson@inetworld.net (Charles H. Sampson) wrote:

>      Does Lion have a memory leak? I have a one-year old MacBook Pro
> that came with Lion. It has three users and most of the time all of them
> are logged on. This is not an issue with Unix, which I used for years
> professionally, and it's not an issue with my old G4 that runs Tiger.
> (Yes, the G4 runs slowly but it's not affected by the number of users
> logged on. If a user is running a compute hog, that's another story.)
> 
>      Every once in a while, at least once a week it seems, the MacBook
> runs glacially slow. The only fix that I've discovered so far is to log
> everybody off and restart. Then all is good, at least for a while.
> 
>                         Charlie

A leak should show up as a process's virtual memory size growing without 
ever leveling off.  It should be easy to find.

10.7 and 10.8 have some bad virtual memory tuning.  Somebody figured 
that the computer would be faster if one app could not cause another app 
to page out, so Lion gives each process a limited amount of RAM.  What 
actually happens is that a process needing a lot of RAM produces so much 
swapping that the boot disk is unusably slow for the entire system.  The 
cause of this type of slowdown doesn't show up well in 'top' or Activity 
Monitor.

10.9 mostly fixes the problem.

Memory can become fragmented but I think only 10.6 and earlier can get a 
severe case of it.  Only certain use cases can cause it.

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#59607

Kevin McMurtrie <mcmurtrie@pixelmemory.us> wrote:

> In article <1llyw85.1g45m681kq3joiN%csampson@inetworld.net>,
>  csampson@inetworld.net (Charles H. Sampson) wrote:
> 
> >      Does Lion have a memory leak? I have a one-year old MacBook Pro
> > that came with Lion. It has three users and most of the time all of them
> > are logged on. This is not an issue with Unix, which I used for years
> > professionally, and it's not an issue with my old G4 that runs Tiger.
> > (Yes, the G4 runs slowly but it's not affected by the number of users
> > logged on. If a user is running a compute hog, that's another story.)
> > 
> >      Every once in a while, at least once a week it seems, the MacBook
> > runs glacially slow. The only fix that I've discovered so far is to log
> > everybody off and restart. Then all is good, at least for a while.
> 
> A leak should show up as a process's virtual memory size growing without
> ever leveling off.  It should be easy to find.

     As time permits, I'll check this out. First I'll have to write down
what the startup VM sizes of our common applications are (there are only
a few of them), then use that to check when the problem occurs.

> 10.7 and 10.8 have some bad virtual memory tuning.  Somebody figured 
> that the computer would be faster if one app could not cause another app
> to page out, 

     Somebody figured out wrong. If you implement virtual memory using a
least-recently-used (LRU) swapping strategy the system tunes itself on
the fly, depending on memory usage at the time. This is well-known. Of
course, if you don't have enough real memory for what you're trying to
do, then you get a lot of swapping out and reading back in, a condition
known as thrashing. In that case, you have either an insufficient memory
problem or a usage problem and the fix is to get more memory or stop
overloading you computer. (If you already know this, please forgive me
for being so professorial.)

>              so Lion gives each process a limited amount of RAM.  What
> actually happens is that a process needing a lot of RAM produces so much
> swapping that the boot disk is unusably slow for the entire system.  The
> cause of this type of slowdown doesn't show up well in 'top' or Activity
> Monitor.

     I heard elsewhere that Lion is not very good and I should upgrade
to Mountain Lion. Apple wants me to go to Maverick (for free). I've
started looking into that.

> 10.9 mostly fixes the problem.
> 
> Memory can become fragmented but I think only 10.6 and earlier can get a
> severe case of it.  Only certain use cases can cause it.

     Thanks for your help.

                        Charlie
-- 
Nobody in this country got rich on his own.  You built a factory--good.
But you moved your goods on roads we all paid for.  You hired workers we
all paid to educate. So keep a big hunk of the money from your factory.
But take a hunk and pay it forward.  Elizabeth Warren (paraphrased)

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#59583

On 2014-05-21, Charles H. Sampson <csampson@inetworld.net> wrote:
>      Does Lion have a memory leak? I have a one-year old MacBook Pro
> that came with Lion. It has three users and most of the time all of them
> are logged on. This is not an issue with Unix, which I used for years
> professionally, and it's not an issue with my old G4 that runs Tiger.
> (Yes, the G4 runs slowly but it's not affected by the number of users
> logged on. If a user is running a compute hog, that's another story.)
>
>      Every once in a while, at least once a week it seems, the MacBook
> runs glacially slow. The only fix that I've discovered so far is to log
> everybody off and restart. Then all is good, at least for a while.

It sounds like you're assuming it's memory-related. Have you actually
examined the machine while the sluggish condition is present to see
what's actually going on?

-- 
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my ravenous SPAM filter.
I often ignore posts from Google. Use a real news client instead.

JR

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#59606

Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:

> On 2014-05-21, Charles H. Sampson <csampson@inetworld.net> wrote:
> >      Does Lion have a memory leak? I have a one-year old MacBook Pro
> > that came with Lion. It has three users and most of the time all of them
> > are logged on. This is not an issue with Unix, which I used for years
> > professionally, and it's not an issue with my old G4 that runs Tiger.
> > (Yes, the G4 runs slowly but it's not affected by the number of users
> > logged on. If a user is running a compute hog, that's another story.)
> >
> >      Every once in a while, at least once a week it seems, the MacBook
> > runs glacially slow. The only fix that I've discovered so far is to log
> > everybody off and restart. Then all is good, at least for a while.
> 
> It sounds like you're assuming it's memory-related. Have you actually
> examined the machine while the sluggish condition is present to see
> what's actually going on?

     Yes. Activity Monitor shows no CPU hogs and the amount of disk and
network activity seem quite reasonable.

                        Charlie
-- 
Nobody in this country got rich on his own.  You built a factory--good.
But you moved your goods on roads we all paid for.  You hired workers we
all paid to educate. So keep a big hunk of the money from your factory.
But take a hunk and pay it forward.  Elizabeth Warren (paraphrased)

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#59616

On 2014-05-22, Charles H. Sampson <csampson@inetworld.net> wrote:
> Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:
>
>> On 2014-05-21, Charles H. Sampson <csampson@inetworld.net> wrote:
>> >      Does Lion have a memory leak? I have a one-year old MacBook Pro
>> > that came with Lion. It has three users and most of the time all of them
>> > are logged on. This is not an issue with Unix, which I used for years
>> > professionally, and it's not an issue with my old G4 that runs Tiger.
>> > (Yes, the G4 runs slowly but it's not affected by the number of users
>> > logged on. If a user is running a compute hog, that's another story.)
>> >
>> >      Every once in a while, at least once a week it seems, the MacBook
>> > runs glacially slow. The only fix that I've discovered so far is to log
>> > everybody off and restart. Then all is good, at least for a while.
>> 
>> It sounds like you're assuming it's memory-related. Have you actually
>> examined the machine while the sluggish condition is present to see
>> what's actually going on?
>
>      Yes. Activity Monitor shows no CPU hogs and the amount of disk and
> network activity seem quite reasonable.

Where's the evidence of a leak?

-- 
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my ravenous SPAM filter.
I often ignore posts from Google. Use a real news client instead.

JR

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#59647

Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:

> On 2014-05-22, Charles H. Sampson <csampson@inetworld.net> wrote:
> > Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On 2014-05-21, Charles H. Sampson <csampson@inetworld.net> wrote:
> >> >      Does Lion have a memory leak? I have a one-year old MacBook Pro
> >> > that came with Lion. It has three users and most of the time all of them
> >> > are logged on. This is not an issue with Unix, which I used for years
> >> > professionally, and it's not an issue with my old G4 that runs Tiger.
> >> > (Yes, the G4 runs slowly but it's not affected by the number of users
> >> > logged on. If a user is running a compute hog, that's another story.)
> >> >
> >> >      Every once in a while, at least once a week it seems, the MacBook
> >> > runs glacially slow. The only fix that I've discovered so far is to log
> >> > everybody off and restart. Then all is good, at least for a while.
> >> 
> >> It sounds like you're assuming it's memory-related. Have you actually
> >> examined the machine while the sluggish condition is present to see
> >> what's actually going on?
> >
> >      Yes. Activity Monitor shows no CPU hogs and the amount of disk and
> > network activity seem quite reasonable.
> 
> Where's the evidence of a leak?

     No direct evidence. Just a shot in the dark trying to come up with
an explanation for the slowing down.

                        Charlie
-- 
Nobody in this country got rich on his own.  You built a factory--good.
But you moved your goods on roads we all paid for.  You hired workers we
all paid to educate. So keep a big hunk of the money from your factory.
But take a hunk and pay it forward.  Elizabeth Warren (paraphrased)

[toc] | [prev] | [next] | [standalone]

#59649

On 2014-05-23, Charles H. Sampson <csampson@inetworld.net> wrote:
> Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:
>
>> On 2014-05-22, Charles H. Sampson <csampson@inetworld.net> wrote:
>> > Jolly Roger <jollyroger@pobox.com> wrote:
>> >
>> >> On 2014-05-21, Charles H. Sampson <csampson@inetworld.net> wrote:
>> >> >      Does Lion have a memory leak? I have a one-year old MacBook Pro
>> >> > that came with Lion. It has three users and most of the time all of them
>> >> > are logged on. This is not an issue with Unix, which I used for years
>> >> > professionally, and it's not an issue with my old G4 that runs Tiger.
>> >> > (Yes, the G4 runs slowly but it's not affected by the number of users
>> >> > logged on. If a user is running a compute hog, that's another story.)
>> >> >
>> >> >      Every once in a while, at least once a week it seems, the MacBook
>> >> > runs glacially slow. The only fix that I've discovered so far is to log
>> >> > everybody off and restart. Then all is good, at least for a while.
>> >> 
>> >> It sounds like you're assuming it's memory-related. Have you actually
>> >> examined the machine while the sluggish condition is present to see
>> >> what's actually going on?
>> >
>> >      Yes. Activity Monitor shows no CPU hogs and the amount of disk and
>> > network activity seem quite reasonable.
>> 
>> Where's the evidence of a leak?
>
>      No direct evidence. Just a shot in the dark trying to come up with
> an explanation for the slowing down.

The key to solving the problem is knowing the cause, and to learn that
you need to examine the system while the condition is happening. For
instance, what messages are displayed in the console and system logs
when the condition is in play? If there were a memory leak, I would
expect one or more processes to show that they are using inordinate
amounts of memory in the activity monitor memory page.

-- 
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my ravenous SPAM filter.
I often ignore posts from Google. Use a real news client instead.

JR

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