iPhone rotation causes memory warning

Question

I am introducing auto-rotation to my app and I'm having an issue with a memory warning. Whatever orientation I start my app in, as long as the device remains in that orientation, I get no memory warnings. However, the first time I rotate the device the following warning is placed on the console: Safari got memory level warning, killing all documents except active. When this happens all view controllers, other than the one be viewed, are unloaded - this produces unexpected behaviors when navigating back to view controllers that should normally already be on the stack. The app never crashes and this warning occurs once upon the first rotation, after that it never happens (until I stop/start the app again). Also, this only happens on the device - no memory warning when running in simulator.

Has anyone seen this behavior? In any case, does anyone have any suggestions on what I might try in order to remove the memory warning.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

You can't assume that memory warnings will never happen; you have to handle them gracefully. Suggestions:

• Check for memory leaks with Leaks (note that it doesn't catch all leaks).
• Fix your view controllers to handle a view reload. Specifically (unless you override -(void)loadView), it'll call -(void)viewDidUnload on a memory warning and -(void)viewDidLoad when it becomes visible again. You might fix this by saving state in the view controller and restoring it to the views in -(void)viewDidLoad.
• If you can't be bothered handling the memory warning, implement -(void)didReceiveMemoryWarning and do not super-call (i.e. comment out [super didReceiveMemoryWarning]). This is lazy, and might cause a crash if your app ends up using too much memory (background apps like Safari and Phone will be killed first).

You can test memory warning behaviour with the "simulate memory warning" option in the simulator.