Open files

[Ling_2]

Hi

May I know how to reduce the no of open files? I realised that it will keep increasing till it reaches its limit. I have tunned it before. Unless I restart the database else the no of open files will not decrease, any help please? Thanks!

[Olav Baadsvik]

Hi,

The number of open files depends on the
use of the software on your machine.
You may reduce the number of open files by
setting kernel-parameters low to block the
opening of new files after a certain number of files are opened, but I am sure that this
is not what you want.

I would think that the reason for your problem
is one or more of the following:

1.kernel parameter nfile is too low.
2.kernel parameter maxfiles is too low
3.Bad usage of applications on your system
4.Bug in your applications; not closings
files/sockets.
5.The number of users is too high.


What is the error-message you see?
What is the value of nfile and maxfiles?

Regards
Olav

[Deepak Extross]

I'm not sure if I understand your question correctly, but are you looking for
getconf OPEN_MAX
and
sysconf OPEN_MAX ?

This has nothing to do with any database, though. Could you perhaps clarify what the relationship between your database and number of open files is?

[Justo Exposito]

Hi Ling,

If you are using Oracle Database, you can reduce the number of open file by using shared server Vs dedicated server, or reducing the number of users that open a connection to your database.

Other posibility is to have less tablespace and greater than now.

You can check your open files by process with glance, if you don't have glance installed you can do it by a trial license from the application CD with sw_install.

Hope this help,

Justo.

[Ling_2]

Hi

Thanks for all the replies!

1. I have tune the nfile parameter before and it is 9000 now.

2. There are a fix number of connectiosn to the database and I have checked that teh open cursors have not exceed in Oracle

So what could be causing the open files? Any ways of killing some of them which are already dead? PLease advice. Thanks!

[Steven Gillard_2]

You'll need to do some investigating to find out which processes are opening all the files. It's likely that you have an application with a 'file descriptor leak', ie it opens lots of files but forgets to close them.

Grab a copy of lsof from the porting centre and look for processes with lots of open files. Monitoring this information over time should reveal the culprit.

Regards,
Steve