Memory Monitor for E-Reader Memory Tracking
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Solution Overview
Problem
In computer systems, especially those with limited hardware resources like e-reader devices, monitoring memory consumption is challenging due to the lack of tools for tracking memory usage by individual functions or operations, leading to difficulties in identifying low memory conditions and ensuring new software releases do not cause excessive memory issues.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a memory monitor that records memory logs, including System Free Memory and Process Memory Consumption values, and using tools like vmstat and smem to track memory usage over various scenarios, with the ability to store data locally and transmit it for remote analysis, enabling Memory Acceptance Tests to evaluate memory performance and health.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If memory monitoring tools are implemented to track memory usage by individual functions, then measurement precision of memory consumption is improved, but device complexity increases due to additional monitoring infrastructure
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a memory monitor as an intermediary component that sits between the operating system and applications, capturing memory allocation events and stack trace information. This mediator approach enables precise memory consumption tracking without requiring modifications to individual applications or functions, thereby improving measurement precision while limiting the increase in device complexity to a single centralized monitoring component.
2Reliability
If comprehensive memory logging is performed to track all memory operations, then reliability of memory health assessment is improved, but loss of time occurs due to increased I/O operations and processing overhead
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts only the critical memory consumption data and stack trace information needed for reliability assessment, rather than logging all memory operations in detail. By selectively capturing allocation events, deallocation events, and low-memory conditions along with their associated stack traces, the system achieves reliable memory health assessment while minimizing the time loss associated with comprehensive logging and I/O operations.
3Difficulty of detecting and measuring
If memory monitoring captures detailed stack trace information for each allocation event, then difficulty of detecting and measuring memory issues is reduced, but loss of information storage increases due to voluminous log data
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the memory monitoring data into distinct categories: allocation events with stack traces, deallocation events with stack traces, and low-memory conditions with stack traces. This segmentation allows the system to capture detailed information for detecting and measuring memory issues while organizing the log data in a structured manner that facilitates efficient storage, retrieval, and analysis, thereby reducing the overall burden of handling voluminous log data.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and methods are provided for monitoring memory consumption in computing devices. Memory monitoring can be performed by tracking multiple parameters on both a regular schedule and in response to the detection of certain events. These memory parameters can include the total amount of free memory in the system, the memory usage associated with certain processes, and stack traces of current threads. These memory parameters can be stored locally in a memory log on the device's secondary storage and then transmitted to a remote test system for detailed analysis along with the memory logs from other devices.