So am I being overly paranoid concerning the "leak" potential of mod_perl programming?
If I start with "strict" code to begin with and try my best to stay away from the problems you mentioned, then any potential memory leak/drain issues will be avoided? Keep in mind, although my application is not designed to launch the space shuttle, I do want it to be solid/stable/peformance-packed from the ground up. I will be also be using MySql with the Apache::DBI module. Thanks in advance. Gregory At 11:34 PM 5/19/2002 -0400, you wrote: > > I have a couple of questions regarding leaking memory in mod_perl: > > > > 1. What are the main culprits, in order of severity, of memory leaks, >i.e.: > > > > a. global variables (NOT lexically scoped via my) > > b. ... > > c. ... > > > > 2. When writing code from scratch (a new application), what is the >best > > way to avoid creating leaks to begin with, i.e., use strict;, PerlWarn >On, > > etc.. ? > >There are actually not very many ways you can leak memory in Perl (and >thus mod_perl). Most people confuse memory growth with memory leakage. >If you want to know how to avoid memory growth, look at the performance >tuning stuff in the Guide, like passing references, avoiding slurping of >large files, controlling the buffering of DBI result sets, etc. > >Leaks are caused by circular references, the string form of eval (at >least it used to leak a little), nested closures (sometimes created >accidentally with the Error module), and one or two obscure syntax >problems. I think one of them involved code like "my $x = 7 if $y;". >Matt Sergeant got bitten by this in the early stages of AxKit >development, and the details are in the mailing list archive. > >Global variables by themselves are not a source of leaks or growth. If >you slurp a large file into a global, your process will grow, but the >same is true for a lexical. > >- Perrin
