Memory problems

[Ken Seehart]

My beta testers are complaining about excessive memory usage.  It's a 
wxPython app with several embedded mozilla activex controls and a local 
web server.

Unfortunately, Python has some problems in this area.  In particular, 
since ubiquitous lists and dictionaries are dynamically resized as 
needed, memory fragmentation seems inevitable. 

Also, memory freed by python apparently is not returned to the OS 
according to this article:
http://effbot.org/pyfaq/why-doesnt-python-release-the-memory-when-i-delete-a-large-object.htm

Are there any good general countermeasures to make an application use 
less memory?  Any good overview articles on this subject?

Thanks (and Happy Thanksgiving),
- Ken Seehart