But cache is turned off in admin

[met00]

cache is turned off in the admin, but the site went down today with the following error.

PHP Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 23068672 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 14942208 bytes) in /rootpath/thedomain.com/httpdocs/includes/classes/cache.class.php(313) : eval()'d code on line 21846

Now, since cache is OFF, why the hell am I getting an error message related to something I'm not running?

[the temporary solution, just to get the site up, was to add ini_set("memory_limit","256M"); to the top of includes/configure.php - and really, that is NOT a solution. It is a hell of a KLUGE]

[met00]

Debugging continues...

From application_top

// BOF: MOD - Page cache contribution - by Chemo
// Define the pages to be cached in the $cache_pages array
  $cache_pages = array('index.php', 'product_info.php');
  if (!tep_session_is_registered('customer_id') && ENABLE_PAGE_CACHE == 'true') {
// Start the output buffer for the shopping cart
    ob_start();
    require(DIR_WS_BOXES . 'shopping_cart.php');
    $cart_cache = ob_get_clean();
// End the output buffer for cart and save as $cart_cache string
  
// Loop through the $cache_pages array and start caching if found
    foreach ($cache_pages as $index => $page){
      if ( strpos($_SERVER['PHP_SELF'], $page) ){
        include_once(DIR_WS_CLASSES . 'page_cache.php');
        $page_cache = new page_cache($cart_cache);
        // The cache timelife is set globally
        // in the admin control panel settings
        // Example below overrides the setting to 60 minutes
        // Leave blank to use default setting
        // $page_cache->cache_this_page(60);
        $page_cache->cache_this_page();
      }
    }
  }

so every index.php and product_info.php get's cached... IF cache is on... That would explain why memory would be an issue with a store with 1200 categories and 30,000 products. BUT, if cache is set to false, then again, this shouldn't be a problem... both standard cache and chemo cache are "off" per the admin interface.