Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!emory!athena.cs.uga.edu!shen
From: shen@athena.cs.uga.edu (Mr. Mingzuo Shen)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.ultrix
Subject: memory usage?
Message-ID: <1991Feb24.152828.13746@athena.cs.uga.edu>
Date: 24 Feb 91 15:28:28 GMT
Sender: shen@athena.cs.uga.edu (Mr. Mingzuo Shen)
Distribution: usa
Organization: University of Georgia, Athens
Lines: 37


    I have a DECstation 3100 sitting on my desk and I have virtually
exclusive use although I am not the administrator. I was just reminded
that I am supposed to leave emacs running all the time (while after I
finished with one file, I quit vi). But I remember that emacs is a
memory hog. My question is: will it compromise my batch or background
programs (which could run four days one cycle) if I leave emacs running?

    If I do a "ps aux" I found another interesting fact: the PostScript
previewer on the DEC, dxpsview, is an even stronger memory eater. The
following are using the major portion of the memory (I presume):

	%MEM    Command
	14.2    egradbig                      (my background program)
	10.4    - :0 (Xcfb)                   (the X server?)
	14.6    dxpsview                      
	5.2     /usr/bin/dxsession :0
	4.4     emacs

My second question: these pecentages do not add to 100%. What do they
mean? I used a method suggested on the net (wc -c < /dev/mem) to check
the physical memory; I think there are 24 MB on this machine. 

    Yesterday I was trying to compile a FORTRAN program system on
this machine, but it gave many "system full", "binary write failed",
"write -1, instead of 8012", etc. (I do not remember the exact
words). The final binary file was not executable (I had to chmod +x,
and it gave me "Segmentation fault" after that). But the compilation
was OK when I used another identical machine (but virtually empty if
I check it with ps aux - only the Xcfb is eating about 8% of MEM). 
My third question: did my failure in compiling the program have to do
with the memory usage?

Sorry if these questions are too obvious; thanks in advance on any
advise on memory usage on my machine.

-mingzuo


Brought to you by Super Global Mega Corp .com