$ ./python -m test.regrtest -ugui -v test_idle test_gc
...
======================================================================
FAIL: test_saveall (test.test_gc.GCTests)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/serhiy/py/cpython-2.7/Lib/test/test_gc.py", line 200, in test_saveall
    self.assertEqual(gc.garbage, [])
AssertionError: Lists differ: [<Tkinter.StringVar instance a... != []

First list contains 24 additional elements.
First extra element 0:
PY_VAR0

Diff is 1123 characters long. Set self.maxDiff to None to see it.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

It looks like test_idle leaks uncollectable objects.

I modified regrtest to use tracemalloc, I attach the output: tracemalloc.txt. Good luck to find the leaks ;-)

regrtest_tracemalloc.patch: my patch for regrtest.py to dump the traceback where garbage objects where allocated using tracemalloc.
http://pytracemalloc.readthedocs.org/

(Note: you need to recompile Python to use tracemalloc on Python < 3.4.)

Indeed, there are a lot of small reference loops in ConfigDialog. Tk variables save reference to the dialog and the dialog saves references to variables. Either variables should be created with different argument (i.e. self.parent), or they should be deleted when ConfigDialog is destroyed.

ConfigDialog is a good guess as I added a minimal test this month.
I will try to revise to not create loops in the first place.

Here is a patch against 2.7 which get rid of reference loops in Tk variables and Font. This will fix not only ConfigDialog, but any similar user code.

In 3.4+ such reference loops are successfully resolved, but I think we should foreport this path to 3.4+ because it also fixes other minor bug: callbacks registered to trace variable now live while the variable lives, not while widget lives.

I agree that the patch shoukd also br applied to 3.4.

F:\Python\dev>2\py27\pcbuild\python_d.exe -m test.regrtest -R :: -uall test_idle
test_idle leaked [1945, 1945, 1945, 1945] references, sum=7780

There are none with 3.4, so the new gc is doing its job.
There are also none with test_configdialog renamed xtest... ,

GetCfgSectionNameDialog.__init__ in configSectionNameDialog.py saves self.parent for later use as the parent for XyxVars.  I am looking at doing the same for config dialog.

New changeset 6b7f189daa62 by Terry Jan Reedy in branch '2.7':
Issue #22068: Don't create self reference cycles in idlelib.ConfigDialog.
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/6b7f189daa62

New changeset 1927f47a1838 by Terry Jan Reedy in branch '3.4':
Issue #22068: Don't create self reference cycles in idlelib.ConfigDialog.
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/1927f47a1838

-R no longer finds leaks with current Idle tests. There might still be some in modules not tested.

If there are no objections I'll commit the patch.

New changeset 0b79c702abda by Serhiy Storchaka in branch '2.7':
Issue #22068: Avoided reference loops with Variables and Fonts in Tkinter.
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/0b79c702abda

New changeset 873002eb8087 by Serhiy Storchaka in branch '3.4':
Issue #22068: Avoided reference loops with Variables and Fonts in Tkinter.
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/873002eb8087

New changeset f44f5daff665 by Serhiy Storchaka in branch 'default':
Issue #22068: Avoided reference loops with Variables and Fonts in Tkinter.
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/f44f5daff665