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JAVA: Debugging a permgen leak

Out of memory errors in java can some time mean a memory leak in application. One class of those memory errors are related to memory pressure in permgen. This is typically identified by exception message like Root Cause Exception: java.lang.OutOfMemoryError: PermGen space

As memory management is done by jvm, identifying and debugging memory leaks in java can be tricky. In case of permgen leaks, more so. Reasons for this include:

• Permgen leaks are rare
• More often than not; out of memory errors due to permgen space is not a leak but a legitimate case of memory crunch. In which case you either need to allocate more memory to permgen using -XX:MaxPermSize jvm parameter or strip down your libraries and dependencies.