Xms Xmx and PermSpace

Guru asked me this question today about the Xms Xmx and Permspace parameters passed to java programs.

-Xms is the initial heap size and

-Xmx is the maximum

PermSpace is the area of the VM that is used to store data structures
and class information (not instances, but the class definitions
themselves).

From: http://forums.sun.com/thread.jspa?threadID=775925

Keep in mind that the permanent area is not a subset of the heap.
The pictures on the page http://java.sun.com/docs/hotspot/gc/index.html
erroneously show permspace as a subset of the heap defined by -Xmx
parameter. This is a bug in the documentation (state February 2004).