Hi, gwidion@xxxxxxxxxx (2005-02-20 at 0203.45 -0200): > Let X bre a Huge Amount of Memory (tm) taken by said image, and Y be A > Couple Kilobytes (tm) used by scaled down version > Your proccess: > - Initially using X memory > duplicate image -> now using x * 2 memory. I assume there is Copy On Write, thus delaying real memory usage (and the bandwidth too) until the data changes. Lets see COW at work: Just after launching gimp: total used free shared buffers cached Mem: 514308 444404 69904 0 6180 137996 -/+ buffers/cache: 300228 214080 Swap: 264144 63140 201004 2000*2000 image created and plasma filter run: total used free shared buffers cached Mem: 514308 500864 13444 0 6336 138012 -/+ buffers/cache: 356516 157792 Swap: 264144 63140 201004 script-fu console launched: total used free shared buffers cached Mem: 514308 503428 10880 0 6372 138268 -/+ buffers/cache: 358788 155520 Swap: 264144 63140 201004 gimp-image-duplicate invoked once, id reported is 2: total used free shared buffers cached Mem: 514308 503000 11308 0 6532 138260 -/+ buffers/cache: 358208 156100 Swap: 264144 63140 201004 Invoked 3 more times (ids 3, 4 and 5), to check the apps is not reusing memory it already owns: total used free shared buffers cached Mem: 514308 503008 11300 0 6568 138260 -/+ buffers/cache: 358180 156128 Swap: 264144 63140 201004 OK, pushing the limits, so invoked 46 times more (ids 6 to 51): total used free shared buffers cached Mem: 514308 504308 10000 0 7284 136336 -/+ buffers/cache: 360688 153620 Swap: 264144 63364 200780 Used swap and mem (after removing buffers and cache) numbers seem pretty stable, just mimimal increases in both, some KB reduction sometimes (other app releasing mem probably). By your rule, the machine should be crawling now due the 50 copies. Just the pixels are 50 * 2000 * 2000 * 3 = 600 * 10^6, more than the physical RAM. (__) (oo) Moo Super Powers /-------\/ / | || * ||----|| ~~ ~~ GSR