[pylucene-dev] fatal error in GC : too many heap sections.

[Andi Vajda]

On Mon, 19 Nov 2007, Bill Peverill wrote:

> The software versions we use for the search web service are:
>
> Python		version 2.4.4
> Cherrypy		version 2.1.0 (with threading modified to use
> PyLucene.PythonThread)
> Pylucene GCJ 	version 2.2.0-1, built on Windows 2000 with mingw/gcj 3.4.6
> and Python 2.4.3, obtained from the PyLucene download page

I would really really really recommend you switch to a more modern and 
stable VM by switching to PyLucene built with JCC, especially if your 
delivery platform is Windows. This is a new flavor of PyLucene that is not 
built with gcj but with a code generator, JCC, I built for that purpose. JCC 
makes it possible to use PyLucene with a regular Java VM such as Sun's or 
Apple's instead of libgcj.

I might add that the inability to debug the random strange errors we'd get 
on Windows (running Chandler) and the general difficulty in building gcj for 
Windows is what initially motivated this rewrite. Of course, Sun announcing 
the open sourcing of their JDK with OpenJDK [1] has also been a major factor 
here.

PyLucene with JCC has been built on various Linuxes, Windows 2000 and XP,
Mac OS X 10.3, 10.4 and 10.5 with Java 1.5, 1.6 and OpenJDK (Java 1.7) with 
Python 2.3.5, 2.4 and 2.5. It's vastly easier to build as well.

For more information on PyLucene with JCC, please refer to the docs:

    - http://svn.osafoundation.org/pylucene/trunk/README
    - http://svn.osafoundation.org/pylucene/trunk/jcc/README
    - http://svn.osafoundation.org/pylucene/trunk/jcc/jcc/README

Questions and comments are of course welcome on this list.

> We would be grateful for any advice we can get. (Our gratitude could include
> beer contributions or other compensation if appropriate.) We'd also love to
> hear from people who have NOT had this problem.

If you'd like to deliver a keg of beer, my contact info is available on 
request :)

Andi..

[1] http://openjdk.java.net/