How to figure out why the private bytes is growing

[EddieL]

Hi there,

I have been using this excellent tool to try to track down a problem that appears in one of our .NET application. Our application is written in C# but uses a managed C++ .dll that wraps some standard C++ code (an auto generated gSOAP client, if you need all the details). What I have observed is that after a few days or weeks of running smoothly, the number of private bytes start growing, all of a sudden. The memory usage, when the application starts hovers around 58 MB and stays like this for days and weeks. Then it starts to grow and it constantly goes up. With the help of the profiler, I was able to pinpoint the problem on the number of private bytes. The green line is flat for x days and then turns into an inclined plain, climbing higher and higher. Currently, the memory used by this app grew to over 600 MB, when it only started at 58 MB. I read that the private bytes include unmanaged memory. Is there a way I can find out more about that? Idealy would be to know what's the type of the objects that are making up these private bytes.

Any help will be highly appreciated.
Best regards,
Eddie

[Brian Donahue]

Hi Eddie,

I see that you have already been in contact with Andrew about this. I don't have much to add myself except that you may be able to get at least a bit more info at no cost to you using Windows Debugging Tools (windbg). Tess covers this pretty extensively in her blog:

http://blogs.msdn.com/tess/archive/2005/11/25/i-have-a-memory-leak-what-do-i-do-defining-the-where.aspx

Also, I believe that our own Memory Tracker can show you, graphically, if there is a bunch of free space in your LOH.
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Brian Donahue
Technical Support
Red Gate Software Ltd.
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