there is no limit so far as I know, but I haven't done tests. We ve heard
that people have run Amelia with as many as a million observations and
(too!) large numbers of variables. I suspect that they'd need more ram
than 50megs to do that (although Gauss will start swapping to disk if
necessary, it becomes much slower when it does). Has anyone else tried
this?
Gary
: Gary King, King(a)Harvard.Edu
http://GKing.Harvard.Edu :
: Center for Basic Research Direct (617) 495-2027 :
: in the Social Sciences Assistant (617) 495-9271 :
: 34 Kirkland Street, Rm. 2 HU-MIT DC (617) 495-4734 :
: Harvard U, Cambridge, MA 02138 eFax (928) 832-7022 :
On Sun, 25 May 2003 joew(a)georgetown.edu wrote:
Is there an absolute limit to the amount of physical
memory that one
can allocate to Amelia for Windows?
I have run Amelia for several days on a PC with 256MB of RAM, Windows
2000 Pro, and a 1.2 ghz AMD Athlon (better floating point) CPU.
Neither increasing the value of the configuration file's max_workspace
parameter nor increasing the amount of physical RAM in the PC seems to
increase the RAM allocated to the GSRUN process.
1. I set the max_workspace parameter value to 50 MB, and the Windows
Task Manager's Processes window indicated that the GSRUN process was
using about 50MB of RAM.
2. I reset the parameter to 65MB, reran the same job, and found that
the GSRUN process still ran using only 50MB of RAM.
3. Today, I upgraded the RAM in the PC from 256MB to 768MB and set the
max_workspace parameter value to 300MB. The GSRUN process still runs
using only 50MB of RAM.
Note that in each instance, the RAM usage seemed to increase from ~27MB
during the variance computation stage to ~50MB during the importance
sampling stage.
Do I need to change something other than the value of the max_workspace
parameter? (Yes, I remembered to "uncomment" that line of
configuration code.) Also, my RAM is not cluttered up with a bunch of
memory-resident crud in the background, so I doubt there's a RAM
issue. The Task Manager indicates that, at any given moment during the
importance sampling stage, there is ~500MB of RAM available.
Thanks in advance for any assistance you can offer.
The text of the configuration file I use appears below. Thanks in
advance.
--------------------------
########################################################################
######
# GAUSS - Copyright (C) 1984-1998 Aptech Systems, Inc. All rights
reserved. #
########################################################################
######
# GSRUN.CFG configuration file for GAUSS Run-Time
Module #
########################################################################
######
# You may modify this file upon
installation. #
########################################################################
######
#
#
# Upon startup, GSRUN looks for this configuration file in the
same #
# directory as GSRUN.EXE. This can be changed by defining an
environment #
# variable called GSRUN_CFG which contains the full drive and
path #
# specification of an alternate configuration file. The file name
will #
# remain the
same. #
#
#
########################################################################
######
#
#
# The GAUSSDIR variable below defaults to the location of the .EXE
file #
# when commented out, so most users will not need to change it. If
you #
# want to change it, remove the comment character '#' and set it to
the #
# desired path. GAUSSDIR can be referenced using $(GAUSSDIR) for
any #
# of the other paths or filenames, or they can be hardcoded with
no #
# reference to
GAUSSDIR. #
#
#
# DO NOT put a trailing backslash on GAUSSDIR. GSRUN will remove
it #
# anyway before replacing GAUSSDIR in configuration
variables. #
#
#
########################################################################
######
#
#
# You may also use the $() syntax to reference OS environment
variables. #
# For
example: #
#
#
# tmp_path =
$(TMPDIR) #
#
#
########################################################################
######
# if commented out, default is .EXE location
#GAUSSDIR = c:\gauss
# multiple paths for program files
src_path = $(GAUSSDIR)\src;$(GAUSSDIR)\examples
# one path for library files
lib_path = $(GAUSSDIR)\lib
# one path for the error log file
err_path = $(GAUSSDIR)
# one path and filename for the command log
log_file = $(GAUSSDIR)\command.log
# one path for DLIBRARY command
dlib_path = $(GAUSSDIR)\dlib
# one path for temporary files (should be on RAM disk)
# if commented out use TMP environment variable
#tmp_path =
# one path for SAVE command
#save_path =
# one path for LOADM command
#loadm_path =
# one path for LOADP, LOADF, LOADK command
#loadp_path =
# one path for LOADS command
#loads_path =
# alternate editor name and flags
#alt_editor =
# Set max_workspace to limit the use of extended or expanded memory.
When
# commented out, it defaults to 128.0 (Mbytes). If max_workspace is set
# significantly higher than the amount of physical memory available,
GSRUN
# may take an abnormally long time to load, depending on the memory
manager
# your system uses; that is why we are currently shipping GSRUN with
# max_workspace set to 4.0. You can try commenting it out to see if your
# system has this problem. If it does, set max_workspace to the amount
of
# free memory (in Mbytes) minus 2.0 (the amount needed to load GSRUN).
#
# You will also need to set max_workspace if you are running under MS
Windows
# 3.1, to reserve some memory for the system.
#max_workspace = 8.0 # maximum workspace in megabytes
max_workspace = 300.0
line_numbers = on # on, off Alt-X menu
autoload = on # on, off Ctrl-A
autodelete = on # on, off ''
translate = off # on, off Ctrl-T
transtrack = on # on, off Alt-X menu
declare_warn = off # on, off Ctrl-W
compiler_trace = off # off, file, line, symbol Ctrl-V
user_lib = on # on, off Ctrl-L
gauss_lib = on # on, off ''
enter_execute = on # on, off Alt-F4
tab_size = 4 # 1-8
escape_char = on # on, off, editor recognizes escape character
case_sensitivity = on # on, off, default case sensitivity for
editor
insert_mode = on # on, off, default insert state for editor
ctrl_z = off # on, off, editor saves file with
terminating ^Z
complex_numbers = on # on, off SYSSTATE( 8
complex_char = i # single ascii character SYSSTATE( 9
screen = on # on, off SYSSTATE( 15
print = off # on, off SYSSTATE( 16
lprint = off # on, off SYSSTATE( 17
precision = 80 # 64, 80 SYSSTATE( 12
lpwidth = 80 # 1-256 SYSSTATE( 10
outwidth = 80 # 1-256 SYSSTATE( 11
crout_tol = 1.0e-14 # >= 0.0 SYSSTATE( 13
chol_tol = 1.0e-14 # >= 0.0 SYSSTATE( 14
cache_size = 64 # size of CPU data cache in Kbytes
pqg_dpen_width = 0 # line width for displayed graphs; 0 is
fastest
pqg_ppen_width = 0 # line width for printed graphs; 0 is fastest
dat_fmt_version = v96 # data set / matrix file version
# v89 original DOS format
# v96 universal format
fastio = 50 # 0-100; set higher for faster output, lower
for
# smoother output
matwidth = 500 # right-hand margin (1-500) for displaying
matrices
batchmode = 1 # 0 = interactive mode; 1 = batch mode,
append to
# gauss.log; 2 = batch mode, overwrite
gauss.log
iconized = true # true, false, start GAUSS with Command
window
# iconized; for use when running programs in
DOS
# compatibility window (see DOSWinOpen)
########################################################################
######
# End of
GSRUN.CFG #
########################################################################
######