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mod_perl-2.0.3::docs::User:Conmod_perl-2.0.3::docs::api::Apache2::SizeLimit(3)

NAME
       Apache2::SizeLimit - Because size does matter.

Synopsis
       This module allows you to kill off Apache httpd processes if they grow
       too large.  You can choose to set up the process size limiter to check
       the process size on every request:

	 # in your startup.pl, or a <Perl> section:
	 use Apache2::SizeLimit;
	 # sizes are in KB
	 $Apache2::SizeLimit::MAX_PROCESS_SIZE	= 12000; # 12MB
	 $Apache2::SizeLimit::MIN_SHARE_SIZE	= 6000;	 # 6MB
	 $Apache2::SizeLimit::MAX_UNSHARED_SIZE = 5000;	 # 5MB

	 # in your httpd.conf:
	 PerlCleanupHandler Apache2::SizeLimit

       Or you can just check those requests that are likely to get big, such
       as CGI requests.	 This way of checking is also easier for those who are
       mostly just running CGI scripts under "ModPerl::Registry":

	 # in your script:
	 use Apache2::SizeLimit;
	 # sizes are in KB
	 Apache2::SizeLimit::setmax(12000);
	 Apache2::SizeLimit::setmin(6000);
	 Apache2::SizeLimit::setmax_unshared(5000);

       This will work in places where you are using "SetHandler perl-script"
       or anywhere you enable "PerlOptions +GlobalRequest".  If you want to
       avoid turning on "GlobalRequest", you can pass an "Apache2::RequestRec"
       object as the second argument in these subs:

	 my $r = shift; # if you don't have $r already
	 Apache2::SizeLimit::setmax(12000, $r);
	 Apache2::SizeLimit::setmin(6000, $r);
	 Apache2::SizeLimit::setmax_unshared(5000, $r);

       Since checking the process size can take a few system calls on some
       platforms (e.g. linux), you may want to only check the process size
       every N times.  To do so, put this in your startup.pl or CGI:

	 $Apache2::SizeLimit::CHECK_EVERY_N_REQUESTS = 2;

       This will only check the process size every other time the process size
       checker is called.

Description
       This module is highly platform dependent, please read the Caveats sec-
       tion.  It also does not work under threaded MPMs.

       This module was written in response to questions on the mod_perl mail-
       ing list on how to tell the httpd process to exit if it gets too big.

       Actually there are two big reasons your httpd children will grow.
       First, it could have a bug that causes the process to increase in size
       dramatically, until your system starts swapping.	 Second, it may just
       do things that requires a lot of memory, and the more different kinds
       of requests your server handles, the larger the httpd processes grow
       over time.

       This module will not really help you with the first problem.  For that
       you should probably look into "Apache2::Resource" or some other means
       of setting a limit on the data size of your program.  BSD-ish systems
       have "setrlimit()" which will croak your memory gobbling processes.
       However it is a little violent, terminating your process in
       mid-request.

       This module attempts to solve the second situation where your process
       slowly grows over time.	The idea is to check the memory usage after
       every request, and if it exceeds a threshold, exit gracefully.

       By using this module, you should be able to discontinue using the
       Apache configuration directive "MaxRequestsPerChild", although you can
       use both if you are feeling paranoid.  Most users use the technique
       shown in this module and set their "MaxRequestsPerChild" value to 0.

Shared Memory Options
       In addition to simply checking the total size of a process, this module
       can factor in how much of the memory used by the process is actually
       being shared by copy-on-write.  If you don't understand how memory is
       shared in this way, take a look at the extensive documentation at
       http://perl.apache.org/docs/.

       You can take advantage of the shared memory information by setting a
       minimum shared size and/or a maximum unshared size.  Experience on one
       heavily trafficked mod_perl site showed that setting maximum unshared
       size and leaving the others unset is the most effective policy.	This
       is because it only kills off processes that are truly using too much
       physical RAM, allowing most processes to live longer and reducing the
       process churn rate.

Caveats
       This module is platform-dependent, since finding the size of a process
       is pretty different from OS to OS, and some platforms may not be sup-
       ported.	In particular, the limits on minimum shared memory and maximum
       shared memory are currently only supported on Linux and BSD.  If you
       can contribute support for another OS, please do.

       Supported OSes

       linux
	   For linux we read the process size out of /proc/self/statm.	This
	   seems to be fast enough on modern systems. If you are worried about
	   performance, try setting the "CHECK_EVERY_N_REQUESTS" option.

	   Since linux 2.6 /proc/self/statm does not report the amount of mem-
	   ory shared by the copy-on-write mechanism as shared memory. Hence
	   decisions made on the basis of "MAX_UNSHARED_SIZE" or
	   "MIN_SHARE_SIZE" are inherently wrong.

	   To correct the situation there is a patch to the linux kernel that
	   adds a /proc/self/smaps entry for each process. At the time of this
	   writing the patch is included in the mm-tree (linux-2.6.13-rc4-mm1)
	   and is expected to make it into the vanilla kernel in the near
	   future.

	   /proc/self/smaps reports various sizes for each memory segment of a
	   process and allows to count the amount of shared memory correctly.

	   If "Apache2::SizeLimit" detects a kernel that supports
	   /proc/self/smaps and if the "Linux::Smaps" module is installed it
	   will use them instead of /proc/self/statm. You can prevent
	   "Apache2::SizeLimit" from using /proc/self/smaps and turn on the
	   old behaviour by setting $Apache2::SizeLimit::USE_SMAPS to 0 before
	   the first check.

	   "Apache2::SizeLimit" also resets $Apache2::SizeLimit::USE_SMAPS to
	   0 if it somehow decides not to use /proc/self/smaps. Thus, you can
	   check it to determine what is actually used.

	   NOTE: Reading /proc/self/smaps is expensive compared to
	   /proc/self/statm. It must look at each page table entry of a
	   process.  Further, on multiprocessor systems the access is synchro-
	   nized with spinlocks. Hence, you are encouraged to set the
	   "CHECK_EVERY_N_REQUESTS" option.

	   The following example shows the effect of copy-on-write:

	     <Perl>
	       require Apache2::SizeLimit;
	       package X;
	       use strict;
	       use Apache2::RequestRec ();
	       use Apache2::RequestIO ();
	       use Apache2::Const -compile=>qw(OK);

	       my $x= "a" x (1024*1024);

	       sub handler {
		 my $r = shift;
		 my ($size, $shared) = $Apache2::SizeLimit::HOW_BIG_IS_IT->();
		 $x =~ tr/a/b/;
		 my ($size2, $shared2) = $Apache2::SizeLimit::HOW_BIG_IS_IT->();
		 $r->content_type('text/plain');
		 $r->print("1: size=$size shared=$shared\n");
		 $r->print("2: size=$size2 shared=$shared2\n");
		 return Apache2::Const::OK;
	       }
	     </Perl>

	     <Location /X>
	       SetHandler modperl
	       PerlResponseHandler X
	     </Location>

	   The parent apache allocates a megabyte for the string in $x. The
	   "tr"-command then overwrites all "a" with "b" if the handler is
	   called with an argument. This write is done in place, thus, the
	   process size doesn't change. Only $x is not shared anymore by means
	   of copy-on-write between the parent and the child.

	   If /proc/self/smaps is available curl shows:

	     r2@s93:~/work/mp2> curl http://localhost:8181/X
	     1: size=13452 shared=7456
	     2: size=13452 shared=6432

	   Shared memory has lost 1024 kB. The process' overall size remains
	   unchanged.

	   Without /proc/self/smaps it says:

	     r2@s93:~/work/mp2> curl http://localhost:8181/X
	     1: size=13052 shared=3628
	     2: size=13052 shared=3636

	   One can see the kernel lies about the shared memory. It simply
	   doesn't count copy-on-write pages as shared.

       Solaris 2.6 and above
	   For Solaris we simply retrieve the size of /proc/self/as, which
	   contains the address-space image of the process, and convert to KB.
	   Shared memory calculations are not supported.

	   NOTE: This is only known to work for solaris 2.6 and above. Evi-
	   dently the /proc filesystem has changed between 2.5.1 and 2.6. Can
	   anyone confirm or deny?

       BSD Uses "BSD::Resource::getrusage()" to determine process size.	 This
	   is pretty efficient (a lot more efficient than reading it from the
	   /proc fs anyway).

       AIX?
	   Uses "BSD::Resource::getrusage()" to determine process size.	 Not
	   sure if the shared memory calculations will work or not.  AIX
	   users?

       Win32
	   Under mod_perl 1, SizeLimit provided basic functionality by using
	   "Win32::API" to access process memory information.  This worked
	   because there was only one mod_perl thread.	With mod_perl 2, Win32
	   runs a true threaded MPM, which unfortunately means that we can't
	   tell the size of each interpreter.  Win32 support is disabled until
	   a solution for this can be found.

       If your platform is not supported, and if you can tell us how to check
       for the size of a process under your OS (in KB), then we will add it to
       the list.  The more portable/efficient the solution, the better, of
       course.

       Supported MPMs

       At this time, "Apache2::SizeLimit" does not support use under threaded
       MPMs.  This is because there is no efficient way to get the memory
       usage of a thread, or make a thread exit cleanly.  Suggestions and
       patches are welcome on the mod_perl dev mailing list.

Copyright
       mod_perl 2.0 and its core modules are copyrighted under The Apache
       Software License, Version 2.0.

Author
       Doug Bagley <doug+modperl bagley.org>, channeling Procrustes.

       Brian Moseley <ix maz.org>: Solaris 2.6 support

       Doug Steinwand and Perrin Harkins <perrin elem.com>: added support for
       shared memory and additional diagnostic info

       Matt Phillips <mphillips virage.com> and Mohamed Hendawi <mhendawi
       virage.com>: Win32 support

       Torsten Foertsch <torsten.foertsch gmx.net>: Linux::Smaps support

perl v5.8.8		      mod_perl-2.0.3::docs::api::Apache2::SizeLimit(3)
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