maximum # of threads question

Hi,

I am using Linux 2.4.18-3 and we are trying to solve a problem related to our java server application. When the application wants to create new threads I get following exception :

java.lang.OutOfMemoryError: unable to create new native thread
at java.lang.Thread.start(Native Method)
at sirrus.authserver.TcpServer$ServerSocketThread.run(TcpServer.java:273)

# of processes running for this application at the time of error : 717.

I did some reseaarch and found outh that there is a 'threads-max' file in /proc/usr/kernel which controls # of threads. I bumped it up from 8170 to 12000. I also bumped up the 'files-max' file value to 75000. I still see the problem. I am using Sun's hotspot jvm version 1.3.1 . BTW, the problem goes away when I use the 'classic' jvm.

Any help is appreciated.

Thanks.

Amar

oo. Sounds like a HotSpot issue to me.. have you tried posting in any of the JVM forums?

Hi Amar,

Were you able to solve this problem? We are facing a similar issue. Appreciate any suggestions you may have.

- Ranga

I had a java.lang.OutOfMemoryError once running an experiment. In my case the error was a result of the jvm reaching its max memory allocation. there is a parameter that limits the amount of memory that the jvm will attempt to use. passing the -Xmx### option sets the maximum size of the allocation pool (and it defaults to 64 megs). the numeric part can be #k or #m to indicate kilo- / mega- bytes (capital K and M work too). the value must be a multiple of 1024 and greater than 2M.

Thanks 0x4B.
I start my application with -Xmx1500m. The error is not because of insufficient memory. Its because of the # of threads being created.
Any ideas?

- Ranga

Ranga,

Unfortunately, we had to limit allowable # of thread for the application. We tried playing with a thread's stack size (-Xss<size> option) to limit memory used by it. The default stack size is 2MB. You can try reducing it.

Amar