[GAP Forum] Attributes Problem

[Michael Hartley]

Attributes, once set, can't be unset. This is wonderful if you plan to 
save processor time. The problem I am facing now is that I am running 
out of memory.

I have plenty of processing time to throw at this problem, because my 
alternative method of solving it
* took a month for this 'test' case
* is taking 2 years for the 'real' case

I have a large pc group (order 2^26), and I want to trace through its 
maximal subgroup structure to find certain 'low' index subgroups. Doing 
this in a breadth-first manner quickly runs out of memory, since the 
number of subgroups rises exponentially with the index. I have a feeling 
the -o option won't help me here.

I reprogrammed everything to do a depth-first search - however, since 
the computed MaximalSubgroups are stored as an Attribute, I run out of 
memory anyway!

I only need each set of MaximalSubgroups once. If GAP can't 'forget' the 
MaximalSubgroups of a PC group,
can I instruct it not to 'remember' them in the first place??

Yours, Mike H,..