Graphical memory usage map using gmemusage

I am a heavy multitasker. I run a lots of apps at once.. sometimes to the point where this dual screen 22" + 14" setup still feels like I need more screen. However, screen space is not the primary problem, but RAM/Swap utilization instead. Its not unusual for me to have 95%+ RAM 90%+ swap (on a 1.2GB RAM with 1.2GB swap machine) utilization with all the apps I ran and freeing the RAM is kindof a tricky task.

I usually use ps and top to detect apps that consume a lot of RAM and stop them. However, the values shown on the commands are hard to be quickly identified due to the scheme of Virtual, Shared, Resident, Swap does not show the values on how I would expect it to be.

So I went googling and I found out about a very ancient tool ported from SGI IRIX called gmemusage. It shows a graphical representation of the memory consumption by apps running on the system in a quite useful display.



Now I can efficiently find apps that uses lots of memory and free up my RAM without resorting to a reboot.

Yum search gmemusage yielded no result. So, a new package review sent #447080

PIDA: An IDE which loves you!

I discovered PIDA while reading around Fedora mailing lists (forgot which thread), and decided to try it out. yum'ed it from the Fedora repository, and launched it.

My first impression - Coool!.. its gvim + version control + shell/terminal + customizable IDE, all in one!.

I usually do development with very basic tools - gvim and a bunch of shells/terminals. I don't like most IDE because of the over-complexity of them. I do use geany or gedit once in a while when I want to have a bit of non-vim'ish behaviour of text editor. But PIDA, its a whole different level. It looks very promising to be my next best-friend.

Not so long after, that I started using it for continuing my current project with Inigo, and quickly, it took over my daily use of gnome-terminal, and my frequent need to change directories and restart Zope. The basic version control feature it have is wonderful. Unlike Eclipse or other IDEs where it is quite hard to get flexibility on how the project is laid out because of the "smartness" of the IDE, PIDA's basic, "stupid", yet useful, version control integration JustWorks.

So far, I have fell in love with this IDE. I haven't tried its other features yet, but I'm quite sure its going to be fun. Its written in Python, so it should be easily extendable. Going to use this a bit more longer and see how my comfort with it - its already replaced my habit of using gnome-terminal at this point of time.

Some screenies: