Re: [SQU] World's Smallest Squid

> Doug wrote:
>
> Hello all,
>
> Squid and SquidGuard perform beautifully as a web filter on
> my tiny linux box. However, after many user queries it just
> stops responding. Instead of adding: memory, disk, file
> descriptors, swap file numbers, what have you to correct the
> problem - I'd rather tune down squid so that it uses minimal
> resources. Can this be accomplished in the squid.conf file?
>
> I can sacrifice response time, throughput, and amount of
> cached data since those are currently beyond my
> requirements.
>
> By the way, the only way I can successfully restart squid is
> to reboot from Linux LRP diskettes which reloads my
> filesystem. I've tried telinit 1, then back to 3. All the squid
> processes reinitialize, but squid still does not respond and
> no errors are posted.

Reduce cache_mem to 4 MB or even lower. Reduce the size of your
cache_dir (this will reduce memory usage and disk space usage).

Raising file descriptors is a pretty cheap optimization, but probably
isn't needed for Linux 2.2.16 in a low load environment (1024 is the
default...and I've seen Squid serving 900 users on 5 T1 lines using only
1400 FDs...so if yours is a low load server it shouldn't be running out
of FDs).

If you think you are overusing FD's you could try putting in a
max_open_disk_fds of 50 or so and see what happens.

However, if Squid stops responding and even a restart doesn't fix it,
you're running into some other problem--in my experience Squid will exit
when overloaded and automatically restart (only to do so over and over
again until finally giving up). There is no reason why a restarted
Squid shouldn't begin answering queries again, unless something is
really wrong. What does your cache.log say right before Squid stops
responding? Maybe upgrading to 2.2.STABLE5 will solve that problem.
(Also consider Henrik Nordstrom's patch set if using the old 2.2 series
of Squid.)

Which brings us to another point. Turning off some or all of your logs
may help a little if you're on a very very small box.

cache_store_log none
cache_log /dev/null
cache_access_log /dev/null

The last two are not recommended, but if you're really desperate they
might help some.
                                  --
                     Joe Cooper <joe@swelltech.com>
                 Affordable Web Caching Proxy Appliances
                        http://www.swelltech.com

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