server reached --max-clients setting

[Frank Bures <li...@chem.toronto.edu>]

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Hi,

I am running spamd with "-m 20" setting, yet I've seen multiple entries like 
these in the logs:

spamd[3098]: prefork: server reached --max-clients setting, consider raising 
it

What would be a good number for "-m" on a Quad Opteron server processing some 
20k messages a day?

Thanks


Frank Bures, Dept. of Chemistry, University of Toronto, M5S 3H6
fbures@chem.toronto.edu
http://www.chem.utoronto.ca
PGP public key: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=index&search=Frank+Bures
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Re: server reached --max-clients setting

[Ronan <r....@qub.ac.uk>]

Matt Kettler wrote:
> Frank Bures wrote:
> 
>>Hi,
>>
>>I am running spamd with "-m 20" setting, yet I've seen multiple
>>entries like
>>these in the logs:
>>
>>spamd[3098]: prefork: server reached --max-clients setting, consider
>>raising
>>it
>>
>>What would be a good number for "-m" on a Quad Opteron server
>>processing some
>>20k messages a day?
> 
> 
> A good number for -m is neither a function of CPU power, nor
> messages/day. It is a function of free memory.
> 
> run the "free" command. Divide the free memory (on the +buffers/cache
> line) by the rss of a spamd child from ps aux. Thats the upper limit on
> how many more spamd's you can run before you start thrashing.
> 
> I'd not immediately go that far, but keep it in mind as being a ceiling.
> 
> Also keep in mind that no matter how many spamd's you have, if you get a
> burst in-rush of mail you'll hit the limit for a short time. You should
> not have to worry too much about it unless it's happening frequently and
> spamcs are timing out.
> 
> 
another option would be to run using the pre 3.1 round robin 
algorithm... This I and others have found to be better equiped to deal 
with a large and constant amount of mails. If the server is primarily a 
spamd machine then I think it would be worth your while to enable 
--round-robin on the CL when you start SA.

Ronan

Re: server reached --max-clients setting

[Matt Kettler <mk...@comcast.net>]

Frank Bures wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am running spamd with "-m 20" setting, yet I've seen multiple
> entries like
> these in the logs:
>
> spamd[3098]: prefork: server reached --max-clients setting, consider
> raising
> it
>
> What would be a good number for "-m" on a Quad Opteron server
> processing some
> 20k messages a day?

A good number for -m is neither a function of CPU power, nor
messages/day. It is a function of free memory.

run the "free" command. Divide the free memory (on the +buffers/cache
line) by the rss of a spamd child from ps aux. Thats the upper limit on
how many more spamd's you can run before you start thrashing.

I'd not immediately go that far, but keep it in mind as being a ceiling.

Also keep in mind that no matter how many spamd's you have, if you get a
burst in-rush of mail you'll hit the limit for a short time. You should
not have to worry too much about it unless it's happening frequently and
spamcs are timing out.