[GHC] #8604: Some stack/vmem limits (ulimit) combinations causing GHC to fail

[GHC]

#8604: Some stack/vmem limits (ulimit) combinations causing GHC to fail
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        Reporter:  clavin         |            Owner:
            Type:  bug            |           Status:  new
        Priority:  normal         |        Milestone:
       Component:  Compiler       |          Version:  7.6.3
      Resolution:                 |         Keywords:
Operating System:  Other          |     Architecture:  x86_64 (amd64)
 Type of failure:  Runtime crash  |       Difficulty:  Unknown
       Test Case:                 |       Blocked By:
        Blocking:                 |  Related Tickets:
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Comment (by int-e):

 Replying to [comment:1 carter]:
 > ghc allocates the stack on the heap, so this may be tripping a corner
 case somehow...

 There are two kinds of stacks. The STG stack (one per Haskell thread) is
 indeed allocated on the heap, grown dynamically, and its maximum size is
 governed by the '-K' RTS option. But each OS thread also has its own C
 stack and the size of that is determined by the stack size resource limit
 by default: ({{{createOSThread()}}} in {{{rts/posix/OSThreads.c}}} uses
 {{{pthread_create()}}} with no specific thread attributes. Quoting {{{man
 pthread_create}}}:

 {{{
 On Linux/x86-32, the default stack size for a new thread is 2
 megabytes. Under the NPTL threading implementation, if the
 RLIMIT_STACK soft resource limit at the time the program started has
 any value other than "unlimited", then it determines the default stack
 size of new threads.
 }}}

 Other implementations may differ.

 I'm not sure whether or how this should be dealt with by ghc. In some
 circumstances, a large C stack is required (depending on used foreign
 libraries), and currently the soft stack resource limit is the knob to
 turn in that case.

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Ticket URL: <http://ghc.haskell.org/trac/ghc/ticket/8604#comment:4>
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