GNU bug report logs - #1504
23.0.60; emacs daemon leaks memory

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Message #5 received at submit <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Markus Triska <markus.triska <at> gmx.at>
To: emacs-pretest-bug <at> gnu.org
Subject: 23.0.60; emacs daemon leaks memory
Date: Sat,  6 Dec 2008 12:20:09 +0100 (CET)

When I do:

   $ emacs -Q --daemon

followed by:

   $ while true; do emacsclient -t -e "(save-buffers-kill-terminal)"; done

then the daemon apparently consumes increasingly more memory.

In GNU Emacs 23.0.60.9 (i386-apple-darwin8.11.1, GTK+ Version 2.12.9)
 of 2008-11-28 on mt-computer.local
Windowing system distributor `The XFree86 Project, Inc', version 11.0.40400000
Important settings:
  value of $LC_ALL: nil
  value of $LC_COLLATE: nil
  value of $LC_CTYPE: nil
  value of $LC_MESSAGES: nil
  value of $LC_MONETARY: nil
  value of $LC_NUMERIC: nil
  value of $LC_TIME: nil
  value of $LANG: en_GB.UTF-8
  value of $XMODIFIERS: nil
  locale-coding-system: nil
  default-enable-multibyte-characters: t

Message #10 received at 1504 <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com>
To: Markus Triska <markus.triska <at> gmx.at>
Cc: 1504 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: 23.0.60; emacs daemon leaks memory
Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 13:25:57 -0500

Could you check whether this happens with the ordinary Emacs server as
well?

Message #15 received at 1504 <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Markus Triska <markus.triska <at> gmx.at>
To: Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com>
Cc: 1504 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: 23.0.60; emacs daemon leaks memory
Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 19:52:54 +0100

Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com> writes:

> Could you check whether this happens with the ordinary Emacs server as

When I do:

   $ emacs -nw -Q --eval "(server-start)"

instead of "emacs -Q --daemon" above, it also uses more and more memory.

Message #20 received at 1504 <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com>
To: Markus Triska <markus.triska <at> gmx.at>
Cc: 1504 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: 23.0.60; emacs daemon leaks memory
Date: Sat, 06 Dec 2008 20:15:54 -0500

Markus Triska <markus.triska <at> gmx.at> writes:

> When I do:
>
>    $ emacs -nw -Q --eval "(server-start)"
>
> instead of "emacs -Q --daemon" above, it also uses more and more
> memory.

Does this memory increase persist across garbage collections?  Also,
could you check if Emacs 22 has a similar problem, or if it's new to
Emacs 23?

Thanks.

Message #25 received at 1504 <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Markus Triska <markus.triska <at> gmx.at>
To: Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com>
Cc: 1504 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: 23.0.60; emacs daemon leaks memory
Date: Sun, 07 Dec 2008 21:59:30 +0100

Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com> writes:

> Does this memory increase persist across garbage collections?

Yes, unfortunately.

> Also, could you check if Emacs 22 has a similar problem

After trying, I found no similar problem in Emacs 22.3 so far. The test
case does not translate directly to older Emacs versions, and in all
compatible cases I tested, CVS and 22.3 performed equally well and OK.

For example, when I do "emacs -Q -nw -f server-start" and evaluate:

   (defun myedit ()
     (run-with-timer 0.1 nil 'server-edit))

   (add-hook 'after-change-major-mode-hook 'myedit)

Then

   $ while true; do emacsclient test.txt; done

does not leak memory, regardless of which version I try it with.

Message #30 received at 1504-done <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com>
To: Markus Triska <markus.triska <at> gmx.at>
Cc: 1504-done <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: 23.0.60; emacs daemon leaks memory
Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2008 15:50:13 -0500

Aha: Emacs wasn't freeing the frame face cache on tty frames.  Fixed.

This, plus a couple of other leaks in term.c that I fixed earlier this
week, accounts for about 95% of the leakage you reported.

There remains a smaller leak occurring in Lisp: see

http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2008-12/msg00443.html

I'll continue looking into that, but it's less urgent because that leak
is much, much slower.  In the meantime, I'm closing the bug.  Thanks for
reporting.

Message #35 received at 1504 <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Markus Triska <markus.triska <at> gmx.at>
To: 1504 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Cc: Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com>
Subject: Re: bug#1504 closed by Chong Yidong <cyd <at> stupidchicken.com> (Re:  23.0.60; emacs daemon leaks memory)
Date: Sat, 13 Dec 2008 01:12:41 +0100

> it's less urgent because that leak is much, much slower.

Serious emacsclient testing can only start when the leak is completely
fixed: I'm trying to trace down a different problem (#1125) which only
seems to happen after entering and exiting emacsclient occasionally.
Still, thank you for the current fixes - I can now run the test cases
for a few minutes instead of only seconds, which is already better.

Also, when I use emacsclient with "-c" instead of "-t" in the test case,
there's a leak that seems to be as severe as before your patches.

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