I have accidentally discovered a way to crash Linux. There is a screensaver with a BUG in it.
The "piecewise" screensaver eats memory continuously while it is running. It eventually starts consuming swap space and when it runs out CRASH!
I found I could run multiple screensavers and was experimenting with increasing the CPU load on the machine when the memory consumption started. When I noticed one program was using 40% of the memory on my new machine with a Gig of memory I knew that had to be the culprit.
I did a Google search and found someone had reported this on a Red Hat site in October 2004. The program is still being put on current distros.
Don't run PIECEWISE. It looks cool but it ain't.
umbrarchist
Last edited on Tuesday July 12th, 2005 18:26 by umbrarchist
____________________
Beware of Vulcans from the Dark Side
____________________
Click here for your Black Profile
|
