What's a great way to automatically warn my Java application when memory is getting low?

Question

Is there an elegant way to automatically fire memory warnings to my Java application when free memory reaches a certain threshold?

Note that this is a Jeopardy-style question to which I already have an answer, just wanted to post it here for the world to discover because the solution helped me a bunch.

Answer 1

Here's a great little class written by Heinz Kabutz that works flawlessly for me "out of the box". Found it in an old "Java specialists" issue: http://www.javaspecialists.eu/archive/Issue092.html

import java.lang.management.ManagementFactory;
import java.lang.management.MemoryMXBean;
import java.lang.management.MemoryNotificationInfo;
import java.lang.management.MemoryPoolMXBean;
import java.lang.management.MemoryType;
import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.Collection;

import javax.management.Notification;
import javax.management.NotificationEmitter;
import javax.management.NotificationListener;

/**
 * This memory warning system will call the listener when we exceed the
 * percentage of available memory specified. There should only be one instance
 * of this object created, since the usage threshold can only be set to one
 * number.
 * 
 * ( adapted from http://www.javaspecialists.eu/archive/Issue092.html )
 */

public class MemoryWarningSystem {

    public interface Listener {

        void memoryUsageLow(long usedMemory, long maxMemory);
    }

    private final Collection<Listener> listeners = new ArrayList<Listener>();

    private static final MemoryPoolMXBean tenuredGenPool = findTenuredGenPool();

    public MemoryWarningSystem() {
        MemoryMXBean mbean = ManagementFactory.getMemoryMXBean();
        NotificationEmitter emitter = (NotificationEmitter) mbean;
        emitter.addNotificationListener(new NotificationListener() {
            @Override
            public void handleNotification(Notification n, Object hb) {
                if (n.getType().equals(
                        MemoryNotificationInfo.MEMORY_THRESHOLD_EXCEEDED)) {
                    long maxMemory = tenuredGenPool.getUsage().getMax();
                    long usedMemory = tenuredGenPool.getUsage().getUsed();
                    for (Listener listener : listeners) {
                        listener.memoryUsageLow(usedMemory, maxMemory);
                    }
                }
            }
        }, null, null);
    }

    public boolean addListener(Listener listener) {
        return listeners.add(listener);
    }

    public boolean removeListener(Listener listener) {
        return listeners.remove(listener);
    }

    public void setPercentageUsageThreshold(double percentage) {
        if (percentage <= 0.0 || percentage > 1.0) {
            throw new IllegalArgumentException("Percentage not in range");
        }
        long maxMemory = tenuredGenPool.getUsage().getMax();
        long warningThreshold = (long) (maxMemory * percentage);
        tenuredGenPool.setUsageThreshold(warningThreshold);
    }

    /**
     * Tenured Space Pool can be determined by it being of type HEAP and by it
     * being possible to set the usage threshold.
     */
    private static MemoryPoolMXBean findTenuredGenPool() {
        for (MemoryPoolMXBean pool : ManagementFactory.getMemoryPoolMXBeans()) {
            // I don't know whether this approach is better, or whether
            // we should rather check for the pool name "Tenured Gen"?
            if (pool.getType() == MemoryType.HEAP
                    && pool.isUsageThresholdSupported()) {
                return pool;
            }
        }
        throw new IllegalStateException("Could not find tenured space");
    }
}

Usage:

    MemoryWarningSystem system = new MemoryWarningSystem();
    system.setPercentageUsageThreshold(0.8d);
    system.addListener(new Listener() {
        @Override
        public void memoryUsageLow(long usedMemory, long maxMemory) {
            System.out.println("low: "+usedMemory+" / "+maxMemory);
        }
    });