apache spark - How to prevent java.lang.OutOfMemoryError: PermGen space at Scala compilation?

Question

I have noticed a strange behavior of my scala compiler. It occasionally throws an OutOfMemoryError when compiling a class. Here's the error message:

[info] Compiling 1 Scala source to /Users/gruetter/Workspaces/scala/helloscala/target/scala-2.9.0/test-classes...
java.lang.OutOfMemoryError: PermGen space
Error during sbt execution: java.lang.OutOfMemoryError: PermGen space

It only happens once in a while and the error is usually not thrown on the subsequent compile run. I use Scala 2.9.0 and compile via SBT.

Does anybody have a clue as to what might be the cause for this error? Thanks in advance for your insights.

Answer 1

I use HomeBrew to install sbt on OS X. It supports a SBT_OPTS argument which can be put in ~/.sbtconfig file with export SBT_OPTS=-XX:MaxPermSize=256M.