From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Oct 16 10:09:18 2003 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C5EA916A4B3 for ; Thu, 16 Oct 2003 10:09:18 -0700 (PDT) Received: from morpheus.mind.net (morpheus.mind.net [69.9.130.12]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id E513A43FF2 for ; Thu, 16 Oct 2003 10:09:17 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jfox@morpheus.mind.net) Received: from morpheus.mind.net (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by morpheus.mind.net (8.12.6/8.12.6) with ESMTP id h9GH9Fdt004647 for ; Thu, 16 Oct 2003 10:09:15 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from jfox@morpheus.mind.net) Received: (from jfox@localhost) by morpheus.mind.net (8.12.6/8.12.6/Submit) id h9GH9FBY004645 for freebsd-questions@freebsd.org; Thu, 16 Oct 2003 10:09:15 -0700 (PDT) Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 10:09:14 -0700 From: John Fox To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Message-ID: <20031016170914.GF9849@mind.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline User-Agent: Mutt/1.4i X-Quip: Fly the white flag of war! Subject: kernel option to increase max open files X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 17:09:18 -0000 Hi, folks. I've got a 2.2.2 machine which I can't currently upgrade, due to funding issues. This machine handles a lot of mail, and I am lately finding dmesg output to be full of "file: table is full" messages, and entries like these in the sendmail log: SYSERR(UID0): readqf: cannot open dfAAA29006: Too many open files in \ system SYSERR(UID0): Cannot open hash database /etc/aliases: Too many open \ files in system So I figure I need to increase the max number of open files available. I've looked around, and it appears I have two different options: 1) Kernel option "options OPEN_MAX=###" which sets the max number of open files per user (which would be 'root' in this case, as that's who sendmail runs as). 2) a login.conf class setting assigned to root. The 'openfiles' setting seems somewhat equivalent to the OPEN_MAX option. However, I am not certain that limits set in login.conf apply to a process being run by a user that didn't log in (sendmail being started by init at boot, rather than from root's login session). I welcome any thoughts/advice on this matter, as I don't want to try either of these changes without having done due diligence. Thank you, -John -- +---------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | John Fox | System Administrator | InfoStructure | +---------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Gideon: I thought you said don't hold a grudge. | | Galen: I don't. I have no surviving enemies...at all. | | -- "Crusdade", _Racing the Night_ | +---------------------------------------------------------------------------+