Thread

Hi,

I use Expression Engine to run 4 website with the MSM and I am currently faced with weird memory usage on my server.

When the machine is fired up it uses around 3500 - 3700 mo of ram. Then when I start various EE sites the memory usage starts increasing rapidly till I reach max memory and server crash. The speed at wich I get to this result vary depending based on wich site is running. The biggest site is hitting 1500 visits an hour wich is not that much.

I tried caching most of the templates without result, I tried manually caching output og my various php scripts with no more luck. I never ran in that kind of problem with EE before but none of my site were that used or that complex.

The machine hosting :
Cent OS
Apache
PHP5
2quad core processor
8gig of ram

My Expression Engine installation uses these plugins / extensions / modules :
FieldFrame
nGen File Field
User by Solspace
Rating by Solspace
ImgSizer
NSM Publish Plus
Gypsy

What version and build of EE are you on? Do you’ve got a link? Is that a self-hosted box? It certainly sounds like an issue with your server, and we usually can’t offer much assistance there…

Thanks for the fast follow up Ingmar!

1.6.8
Yes is is self hosted.
I know is sounds like a server issue but since my IT Manager keeps on bashing at EE I had to try the forums at some point.

As for the link you wans access to the EE Install or the front site? The most visited page is http://www.radiox.com

When you say the server’s “crashing”, does that literally mean it’s going down, needing to reboot? That should never be caused by EE, but even so, surely there are logs that help us to track this issue down? Is it Apache that’s overwhelmed, or MySQL?

I am afraid your question is a bit open-ended. It has all the marks of a server configuration issue to me.

I’ll try to be more specific 😊.

MySQL is on another server and doing very good on it’s own.

Physical memory starts at around 3700mo and slowly climb up to 7100mo (all memory available) then the server comes to a crawl, apache stop responding until it is reloaded. Once we had to reboot the whole server but usually after a couple hours the reload command we send via ssh goes through and it all start over again.

As far as log goes there nothing of interest in apache logs. I don’t have access to any other logs. My main talent is in web development so I’m in the dark when it comes to apache config and such so even if I “smell” a server issue it’s pretty hard for me to track it. I am simply trying to prove that EE or my template has nothing to do with it.

Thierry,

What are your Database Settings set at?

CP Home ›  Admin ›  System Preferences ›  Database Settings

Sounds like it could also be a template causing the issue like a runaway loop or something. Are you using any custom PHP in your templates?

Also what is your PHP memory limit set at?

MySQL :
Non Persistent
Cache : On

There was one or two php warning : arguments supplied for foreach are invalid. But this has been fixed with no effect.

PHP Memory Limit : 32mo

As Ingmar mentioned, we can’t help too much with server configurations.

As a comparison, EngineHosting uses 64M for memory_limit.

As far as your extensions go, are they all the most recent versions?

All but FieldFrame are up to date. I have a strange behavior with the new version but I will try to update it today to rule it out.

We’ll be here.

Ok sorry for the delay. I updated the extension (FF) with no effect. However, our IT admin tweaked the server a bit and now the leak seem to have stopped. Every page takes around 9mo when cached with EE and 11 when cache is off.

The problem now is that httpd process on the server are very large and need a constant reload to prevent them from hanging. I tend to conclude it is a server issue now more than ever.

I’ll have to agree with that assessment, I’m afraid. You can certainly try to optimize your templates or EE in general, als do take a look at those extensions and your implementation. Some of them can take up a lot of system resources.

I’ll take a look at that, thanks for your help 😊

No problem. Post back if there’s anything else we can do, otherwise I’ll close this thread in a few days.