Correct way to cap Mathematica memory use?

Question

Under a 32-bit operating system, where maximum memory allocated to any one program is limited, Mathematica gracefully terminates the kernel and returns a max memory allocati

Answer 1

In Mathematica 8 you could start a memory watchdog, something along the lines of:

maxMemAllowed        = 15449604;
intervalBetweenTests = 1; (*seconds*)
iAmAliveSignal       = 0;
Dynamic[iAmAliveSignal]
RunScheduledTask[
       If[MemoryInUse[] > maxMemAllowed , Quit[], iAmAliveSignal++],      
       intervalBetweenTests];

Remember to run

RemoveScheduledTask[ScheduledTasks[]];

to disable it.

Edit

You may alert or interactively decide what to do before quitting. As requested, here is a trial with 1.3GB allocated. I can't go much further than that in this machine.

maxMemAllowed = 1.3 1024^3; (*1.3 GB*)
intervalBetweenTests = 1; (*Seconds*)
iAmAliveSignal = 0;
leyendToPrint = "";
Dynamic[leyendToPrint]
RunScheduledTask[
  If[MemoryInUse[] > maxMemAllowed, 
   CreateDialog[CancelButton["Max Mem Reached", DialogReturn[]]]; 
   Quit[],
   Print["Memory in use: ", MemoryInUse[]]; 
   leyendToPrint = 
    "Seconds elapsed = " <> ToString[iAmAliveSignal++]], 
  intervalBetweenTests];
IntegerPartitions[320, {15}];