If you get the memory problems working this would be great, but my experience is that most web sites that run into this problem actually have the need to run in a cluster environment anyway. And there a nightly restart does not have an impact.
We are using the VTMalloc which works nicely.
With regards to Eclipse: Yes, I though about it and posted for the google summer of source (use https://openacs.org/xowiki/GSoC?revision%5fid=905352 as it was edited in the current version). I did not look at DLTK though. If you have something going there, I am more than happy to act as a tester and collaborate on functional requirements. You might also want to get Nima on board as he has extensive knowledge in using Eclipse (if I recall correctly).
