LowMem is a test application that tests the ability of Symbian OS applications to handle low memory conditions when they're started. The tool is easy to use and configure, and produces useful log files when run. The tool can be found at the Symbian Signed website. After login to the Symbian Signed site, the tool can be found in the "Pre-test tools" section. We recommend developers to use this tool to pre-test your Symbian OS application before submitting it for the Symbian Signed certification program. This will help you pass testing and ensure you can have your Sony Ericsson smartphone application distributed through the Sony Ericsson Application Shop.

After specifying the application, tests are performed by repeatedly starting it with different heap sizes. For small heap sizes the startup will fail and the application will be started again with a larger heap size. This procedure is repeated until the application successfully starts. The application is considered to have started successfully when the application is still running after a time-out period of, for example, 30 seconds.

After the tests, a pop-up summary box will display the percentage of failed tests as well as any detected memory leaks in the application. Detailed results can be found in log files that are stored at "javascript:void(null);". For each test, the file "Process_Log.txt" provides information about requested free bytes, exit category and exit reason. If the application has any memory leaks during the tests, a file "Leak_log.txt" is created containing relevant information.

Negative exit codes indicate that an error has been returned on startup. These error codes can in many cases be found in the header file "e32std.h". The following error code tends to be returned more often than others:
const TInt KErrNoMemory=(-4);

A value 0 or -1003 indicates that the application was killed by LowMem or exited normally. A positive value indicates that the application panicked.

All other applications should be shut down before running LowMem in order to make sure there's enough free heap for accurate testing. During the tests, you should dismiss any "Not enough memory" dialogs.

The LowMem application settings menu lets you to specify the minimum free heap, the increase per test and a time-out.

The below screenshots show the running of the LowMem application.