Error: Out of memory

The QA Partner 4.0 and 4.01 DB_Connect and DB_Disconnect functions have been observed to allocate virtual memory without freeing it on a Sun Solaris 2.5.1 system using InterSolv ODBC driver qeor708.so to an Oracle 7.2.3 or 8.0.5 database database.

Symptoms of this problem begin with downgraded performance and can include the inability of anyone to login to the UNIX machine that has run out of memory. The QA Partner program with this problem may end with the message:

    *** Error: Out of memory

Closing the QA Partner session that caused the problem does free all of the memory that it had. Any of the users that are using the UNIX machine with this problem can see unusual messages even from system commands, such as:

    can't map segment: errno=11

    too big

    xterm: Error 29, errno 12: Not enough space

We are suspicious of the ODBC driver which is not the latest version. Also, Segue has assured us that the 4Test functions do not allocate virtual memory. The newer version offered through InterSolv requires ODBC 3.0 that 4Test does not support with this UNIX version. A sample test script to detect this problem is available. (get test here)
4Test Solution - If your test scripts make multiple DB_Connect and DB_Disconnect calls, try to combine all of your database requests under a single connection. You may need to define a public HDATABASE handle for all database functions. You must close QA Partner on UNIX to free the allocated memory. This impacts the ability to make full use of testplans or suites. The test scripts invoked from a testplan or a suite must each reconnect to the database. So every test script with a database connection will cause the memory allocated to grow.
TestMap Extensions Solution - If your test scripts make multiple DB_Connect and DB_Disconnect calls, use the TmDbConnect and TmDbDisconnect functions instead, then add another pair of these calls to establish a single connection around your entire test script. This consolidates all DB_Connect sessions into one.