no memory error, failed to allocate memory

Question

I'm new in Ruby On Rails but each time I make a mistake (in a function for instance), my computer (xubuntu 10.10) totally freezes.

Actually I can't do anything except waiting and I finally got an "No memory error -> failed to allocate memory" error after 5 or 10 minutes.

I use rails 3 and mongoDB.

I'm developping from an existing project with many gems, is there any consequences ?

Thank you !

Answer 1

1. Update your Ruby version
2. Run memtest to perform hardware memory test

Answer 2

Possible diagnosis:

• you are using Ruby installed from ubuntu packages
• you have bad physical ram

These days it's good practice to install your rubies through RVM: http://beginrescueend.com/

If you want to test if you RAM is bad try memtest86: http://www.memtest86.com/

I'd go with installing RVM.