GNU bug report logs - #2309
Saving under Windows (sometimes) causes Emacs to freeze and allocate a lot of memory - Emacs 22.3.1

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

From: Fredrik Hellman <fredrik.hellman <at> gmail.com>
To: bug-gnu-emacs <at> gnu.org
Subject: Saving under Windows (sometimes) causes Emacs to freeze and allocate 
	a lot of memory - Emacs 22.3.1
Date: Thu, 12 Feb 2009 13:00:59 +0100

Hello!

I have downloaded and installed the following Emacs version for Windows:

GNU Emacs 22.3.1 (i386-mingw-nt5.1.2600)
 of 2008-09-06 on SOFT-MJASON

When I start emacs, open a file in a buffer, do some changes in it and
then saves the file with C-x C-s Emacs freezes and I can see how the
memory allocated by Emacs slowly increases until it after a few
minutes wakes up again and says in a separate buffer:

Emergency (alloc): Warning: past 95% of memory limit

This problem doesn't always occur on saves.

I don't know what more to tell, but if you want more details about
something, feel free to ask me.

Best regards,
Fredrik Hellman

Message #12 received at 2309 <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Jason Rumney <jasonr <at> gnu.org>
To: fredrik.hellman <at> gmail.com, 2309 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#2309: Saving under Windows (sometimes) causes Emacs to freeze
 and allocate a lot of memory - Emacs 22.3.1
Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2009 21:42:00 +0800

tags 2309 +moreinfo

Fredrik Hellman wrote:
> When I start emacs, open a file in a buffer, do some changes in it and
> then saves the file with C-x C-s Emacs freezes and I can see how the
> memory allocated by Emacs slowly increases until it after a few
> minutes wakes up again and says in a separate buffer:
>
> Emergency (alloc): Warning: past 95% of memory limit
>
> This problem doesn't always occur on saves.
>
> I don't know what more to tell, but if you want more details about
> something, feel free to ask me.
>   

Is there any pattern to when this occurs? Particular file types? Files 
saved in a particular location?

Try setting debug-on-quit to t (you can toggle this variable from the 
Options menu), then when you notice the problem, press C-g and see if 
you get thrown into the lisp debugger.

Message #17 received at 2309-quiet <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Fredrik Hellman <jasonrumney <at> gmail.com>
To: Jason Rumney <jasonr <at> gnu.org>
Subject: Re: bug#2309: Saving under Windows (sometimes) causes Emacs to freeze 
	and allocate a lot of memory - Emacs 22.3.1
Date: Sat, 14 Feb 2009 00:07:31 +0100

Hi!

Thanks for your reply! I toggled the "Enter Debugger on Quit/C-g" on
and got the following output in some buffer when pressing C-g when
Emacs was frozen:

Debugger entered--Lisp error: (quit)
  directory-file-name("d:/")
  make-directory("d:/program/emacs/backup" parents)
  byte-code("ࣁ숀\"� [abs-backup-directory make-directory parents] 3)
  make-backup-file-name-1("c:/home/hellman/programmering/c/flyttal/flyttal/timing.h")
  find-backup-file-name("c:/home/hellman/programmering/c/flyttal/flyttal/timing.h")
  backup-buffer()
  basic-save-buffer-2()
  basic-save-buffer-1()
  basic-save-buffer()
  save-buffer(1)
  call-interactively(save-buffer)

I realized that the path at third line there: make-directory("d:/..."
doesn't make sense any more. When installing this new version of Emacs
on my fresh XP-installation I simply copied my old .emacs-file where
it was written:

(custom-set-variables
 '(backup-directory-alist (quote (("." . "d:/program/emacs/backup"))))

However, d:\ doesn't even exist on my current setup, so I now changed
that to some accessible directory, and voila, the problem seems to be
gone. However, I guess we still can consider this a bug in Emacs as I
guess it shouldn't start allocating increasingly more memory because
of such a thing.

Thanks for the advice about debug-on-quit!

If you want more information, please ask.

Best regards,
Fredrik Hellman

On Fri, Feb 13, 2009 at 2:42 PM, Jason Rumney <jasonr <at> gnu.org> wrote:
> tags 2309 +moreinfo
>
> Fredrik Hellman wrote:
>>
>> When I start emacs, open a file in a buffer, do some changes in it and
>> then saves the file with C-x C-s Emacs freezes and I can see how the
>> memory allocated by Emacs slowly increases until it after a few
>> minutes wakes up again and says in a separate buffer:
>>
>> Emergency (alloc): Warning: past 95% of memory limit
>>
>> This problem doesn't always occur on saves.
>>
>> I don't know what more to tell, but if you want more details about
>> something, feel free to ask me.
>>
>
> Is there any pattern to when this occurs? Particular file types? Files saved
> in a particular location?
>
> Try setting debug-on-quit to t (you can toggle this variable from the
> Options menu), then when you notice the problem, press C-g and see if you
> get thrown into the lisp debugger.
>
>

Message #22 received at 2309-done <at> emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com (full text, mbox):

From: Jason Rumney <jasonr <at> gnu.org>
To: 2309-done <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Cc: fredrik.hellman <at> gmail.com
Subject: Re: bug#2309: Saving under Windows (sometimes) causes Emacs to freeze
 and allocate a lot of memory - Emacs 22.3.1
Date: Tue, 17 Feb 2009 22:25:20 +0800

Fredrik Hellman wrote:
>> When I start emacs, open a file in a buffer, do some changes in it and
>> then saves the file with C-x C-s Emacs freezes and I can see how the
>> memory allocated by Emacs slowly increases until it after a few
>> minutes wakes up again and says in a separate buffer:

Thank you for the extra info you provided.

Emacs appears to be in an infinite loop trying to create the 
non-existent directory "d:/" and all its parents.
I've fixed make-directory to abort this loop when the directory is its 
own parent.

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