Tracking down memory leaks

From	Marc Shapiro <marcnshap@gmail.com>
Newsgroups	linux.debian.user
Subject	Tracking down memory leaks
Date	2015-10-13 16:30 +0200
Message-ID	<qj8Ku-KS-19@gated-at.bofh.it> (permalink)
Organization	linux.* mail to news gateway

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Is there a way to determine what is using up my memory?  I have an 8GB 
system and every few days the memory usage rises to over 7 GB and up to 
a GB, or more of swap is used.  Granted, I have 3 X sessions running, 
along with 2 instances of Firefox and one of Chrome, not to mention up 
to 3 instances of Libre Office, but... When I first added the 8 GB (I 
used to do this on 2.25 GB!) I could run for months without having a 
memory problem.  Now it's every few days.

When this happens, I exit all programs and shut down all three X 
sessions.  I also log out the other two users.  This leaves me with only 
a single login and nothing but bash running.  When I run 'free' it 
usually shows over 2 GB in use!  When I reboot, the memory usage is back 
down at about 250 MB.  Much more reasonable.

So how do I tell what is using up the memory and not freeing it up? Is 
there a way to free that memory without having to reboot?

Marc

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Tracking down memory leaks Marc Shapiro <marcnshap@gmail.com> - 2015-10-13 16:30 +0200
  Re: Tracking down memory leaks The Wanderer <wanderer@fastmail.fm> - 2015-10-13 16:40 +0200
  Re: Tracking down memory leaks Don Armstrong <don@debian.org> - 2015-10-13 17:00 +0200
    Re: Tracking down memory leaks Marc Shapiro <marcnshap@gmail.com> - 2015-10-17 18:10 +0200
      Re: Tracking down memory leaks Don Armstrong <don@debian.org> - 2015-10-18 22:00 +0200
        Re: Tracking down memory leaks Marc Shapiro <marcnshap@gmail.com> - 2015-10-21 07:00 +0200
          Re: Tracking down memory leaks Jörg-Volker Peetz <jvpeetz@web.de> - 2015-10-21 08:40 +0200
            Re: Tracking down memory leaks (SOLVED) Marc Shapiro <marcnshap@gmail.com> - 2015-10-22 16:30 +0200
              Re: Tracking down memory leaks (SOLVED) Nicolas George <george@nsup.org> - 2015-10-22 16:40 +0200
                Re: Tracking down memory leaks (SOLVED) Cindy-Sue Causey <butterflybytes@gmail.com> - 2015-10-23 19:30 +0200
                Re: Tracking down memory leaks (SOLVED) Nicolas George <george@nsup.org> - 2015-10-23 19:40 +0200
                Re: Tracking down memory leaks (SOLVED) Lisi Reisz <lisi.reisz@gmail.com> - 2015-10-23 20:10 +0200
                Re: Tracking down memory leaks (SOLVED) The Wanderer <wanderer@fastmail.fm> - 2015-10-23 20:40 +0200
                Re: Tracking down memory leaks (SOLVED) Reco <recoverym4n@gmail.com> - 2015-10-23 20:20 +0200
                Browser tabs, was Re: Tracking down memory leaks David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2015-10-23 21:00 +0200
              Re: Tracking down memory leaks David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2015-10-22 17:30 +0200
                Re: Tracking down memory leaks Marc Shapiro <marcnshap@gmail.com> - 2015-10-24 08:30 +0200
              Re: Tracking down memory leaks (SOLVED) <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2015-10-23 09:40 +0200
        Re: Tracking down memory leaks Michael Jones <mj@mikejonesey.co.uk> - 2015-10-21 23:40 +0200
  Re: Tracking down memory leaks Michael Jones <mj@mikejonesey.co.uk> - 2015-10-21 23:30 +0200
  Re: Tracking down memory leaks Michael Jones <mj@mikejonesey.co.uk> - 2015-10-21 23:40 +0200

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