source: trunk/gcc/boehm-gc/doc/README.environment@ 3003

The garbage collector looks at a number of environment variables which are
then used to affect its operation.  These are examined only on Un*x-like
platforms.

GC_INITIAL_HEAP_SIZE=<bytes> -  Initial heap size in bytes.  May speed up
                                process start-up.

GC_LOOP_ON_ABORT - Causes the collector abort routine to enter a tight loop.
                   This may make it easier to debug, such a process, especially
                   for multithreaded platforms that don't produce usable core
                   files, or if a core file would be too large.  On some
                   platforms, this also causes SIGSEGV to be caught and
                   result in an infinite loop in a handler, allowing
                   similar debugging techniques.

GC_PRINT_STATS - Turn on as much logging as is easily feasible without
                 adding signifcant runtime overhead.  Doesn't work if
                 the collector is built with SMALL_CONFIG.  Overridden
                 by setting GC_quiet.  On by default if the collector
                 was built without -DSILENT.

GC_PRINT_ADDRESS_MAP - Linux only.  Dump /proc/self/maps, i.e. various address
                       maps for the process, to stderr on every GC.  Useful for
                       mapping root addresses to source for deciphering leak
                       reports.

GC_NPROCS=<n> - Linux w/threads only.  Explicitly sets the number of processors
                that the GC should expect to use.  Note that setting this to 1
                when multiple processors are available will preserve
                correctness, but may lead to really horrible performance.

GC_NO_BLACKLIST_WARNING - Prevents the collector from issuing
                warnings about allocations of very large blocks.
                Deprecated.  Use GC_LARGE_ALLOC_WARN_INTERVAL instead.

GC_LARGE_ALLOC_WARN_INTERVAL=<n> - Print every nth warning about very large
                block allocations, starting with the nth one.  Small values
                of n are generally benign, in that a bounded number of
                such warnings generally indicate at most a bounded leak.
                For best results it should be set at 1 during testing.
                Default is 5.  Very large numbers effectively disable the
                warning.

GC_IGNORE_GCJ_INFO - Ignore the type descriptors implicitly supplied by
                     GC_gcj_malloc and friends.  This is useful for debugging
                     descriptor generation problems, and possibly for
                     temporarily working around such problems.  It forces a
                     fully conservative scan of all heap objects except
                     those known to be pointerfree, and may thus have other
                     adverse effects.

GC_PRINT_BACK_HEIGHT - Print max length of chain through unreachable objects
                     ending in a reachable one.  If this number remains
                     bounded, then the program is "GC robust".  This ensures
                     that a fixed number of misidentified pointers can only
                     result in a bounded space leak.  This currently only
                     works if debugging allocation is used throughout.
                     It increases GC space and time requirements appreciably.
                     This feature is still somewhat experimental, and requires
                     that the collector have been built with MAKE_BACK_GRAPH
                     defined.  For details, see Boehm, "Bounding Space Usage
                     of Conservative Garbage Collectors", POPL 2001, or
                     http://lib.hpl.hp.com/techpubs/2001/HPL-2001-251.html .

GC_ENABLE_INCREMENTAL - Turn on incremental collection at startup.  Note that,
                     depending on platform and collector configuration, this
                     may involve write protecting pieces of the heap to
                     track modifications.  These pieces may include pointerfree
                     objects or not.  Although this is intended to be
                     transparent, it may cause unintended system call failures.
                     Use with caution.

GC_PAUSE_TIME_TARGET - Set the desired garbage collector pause time in msecs.
                     This only has an effect if incremental collection is enabled.
                     If a collection requires appreciably more time than this,
                     the client will be restarted, and the collector will need
                     to do additional work to compensate.  The special value
                     "999999" indicates that pause time is unlimited, and the
                     incremental collector will behave completely like a
                     simple generational collector.  If the collector is
                     configured for parallel marking, and run on a multiprocessor,
                     incremental collection should only be used with unlimited
                     pause time.

The following turn on runtime flags that are also program settable.  Checked
only during initialization.  We expect that they will usually be set through
other means, but this may help with debugging and testing:

GC_FIND_LEAK - Turns on GC_find_leak and thus leak detection.

GC_ALL_INTERIOR_POINTERS - Turns on GC_all_interior_pointers and thus interior
                           pointer recognition.

GC_DONT_GC - Turns off garbage collection.  Use cautiously.