Single of multiple jobs fail with a "Too many Netvault processes running" error, typically when one or more resource intensive jobs are running.
The "Too many Netvault processes running" error can occur due to the NVBU Server's Linux OS limitation on its maximum allowed shared memory.
The Linux server's current shared memory settings can be verified by the following commands:
cat /proc/sys/kernel/shmmax
cat /proc/sys/kernel/shmall
These numbers are reported in bytes and, unless changed, the current shared memory maximum for the Linux OS will only be at the OS default 32 MB, which is extremely low for NetVault to operate properly.
Best practice is that Linux OS's running NVBU Server have their shared memory maximums set to 512 MB or more. Below are instructions on how to increase shared memory on the OS.
Once the OS's settings for maximum shared memory have been increased, increase the NVBU Server's NetVault Configurator's "Process Manager" tab's values for both of the following:
"Shared Memory (Kb) Used for Process Table" <-- 128000 recommended
"Number of Progress Buffers Available to Plugins" <-- 1000 recommended
The Netvault services will need to be re-started in order for these changes to take affect.
That should help allow NetVault to increase the number of processes that it requires for multiple NDMP jobs to successfully run simultaneously.
Below are the steps needed to change the Linux shared memory settings, including an example of the values needed to reset the shared memory to 512 MB, which should be sufficient for NetVault to operate properly.
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How to configure shared memory settings in Linux
Symptoms:
In Linux, the shared memory is not dynamically configured (changed in accordance to application demands on the kernel). For optimum performance, Quest Support will sometimes recommend increasing the system's shared memory.
To check current running shared memory setting issue the following commands
cat /proc/sys/kernel/shmmax
cat /proc/sys/kernel/shmall
Maximum shared memory can safely be set to half of the NVBU Server's physical memory.
For example, if the server has 1GB of physical memory, it's possible to set your shmmax (shared memory maximum) to 512MB, as shown below:
As root:
1. Edit the file /etc/sysctl.conf.
2. Set the shared memory size to 512 MB by adding the following lines to the
end of the file.
kernel.shmmax = 536870912
kernel.shmall = 131072
3. Run the following command from the root prompt.
/sbin/sysctl -p
Every time the machine reboots, the shared memory will be set to this value.
