[svlug] Increasing total processes?

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Edward Roper (eroper at WANfear.com):

> I have a VERY high usage mail server which every once and awhile
> obtains a load average of 30+. Sometimes when in a shell, commands
> fail: Fork Failed: Resource Temporarily Unavailable. I'm assuming this
> is because I've run out of process allocations? Or could it be
> something else. Anyways, what settings can I change to allocate more
> of whatever I might need. ;) Lol I know the question is a little
> vague. Any details that might help I'll be happy to provide. Generally
> there are 400+ sendmail processes running immediately after this
> happens.

Through the 2.2 series, the Linux kernel had an absolute outer limit of
1024 simultaneous processes or threads (regardless of what you jigger 
in the headers).  You may want to upgrade to the 2.3 beta series, in
which the number of processes/threads is limited only by the amount of
total system RAM.

You also might wish to consider a zippier MTA, such as exim, postfix,
or (ugh!) qmail.

-- 
Cheers,                             "Ceterum censeo Linux propaganda est."
Rick Moen                                        -- Seth David Schoen
rick at linuxmafia.com

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