out of memory

[Jim Reid]

>>>>> "Jim" == Jim Turner <jimt at netins.net> writes:

    Jim>    I read in another post you made stating that setting a
    Jim> datasize can force named to take more memory.  What is
    Jim> confusing is how do you test or verify that named will now
    Jim> take the additional memory?  And is there an easy way to see
    Jim> what the process sees as it's limit besides monitoring it
    Jim> until it dies?

No. You could write a program that made getrlimit() and setrlimit()
system calls however. The limit command tells you what the limits are
for your shell (and any processes started from that shell), but
sometimes it tells lies. I don't believe any UNIX system has an API
for these system calls so they can be applied to an arbitrary process.
If the name server's call to setrlimit() fails, it will report this in
the log.

    Jim>    I also received another response from a gentleman that
    Jim> stated even if "options { datasize #; };" is set, the OS may
    Jim> restrict usage based on the user.  That kinda falls back on
    Jim> verifying that named grabbed the memory you told it to take.

The options statement will not make the name server grab more memory
there and then. It just gets the name server to ask the OS to let it
have more memory up to the limit asked for if the process needs it.
Beware also of kernel limits. [These may or may not be configurable.]
They may supersede whatever resource limits are reported by the limit
command.