# ES freezes the server at startup **URL:** \ **Category:** Elasticsearch\ **Created:** [December 17, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676 "2010-12-17T19:08:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Godefroy\_2](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/godefroy_2/32/3082_2.png) [@Godefroy\_2](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Godefroy_2)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/1 "2010-12-17T19:08:41Z")
Hello, I discovered ElasticSearch few weeks ago and I use it for a new project. It's a great tool ! On my laptop (Ubuntu), I have no problem with ES. But when I try to start ES on a server (Debian), the server totally freezes and I have to hard-reboot it. I use the ES out of the box : [http://github.com/downloads/elasticsearch/elasticsearch/elasticsearch-0.13.1.tar.gz](http://github.com/downloads/elasticsearch/elasticsearch/elasticsearch-0.13.1.tar.gz) without configuration for the moment. And I start it with bin/elasticsearch -f (I also tried with the service package, same problem) I tried on two servers : - 1 Dedibox ([Online.net](http://Online.net)), now the server is dead... - 1 Kimsufi ([Kimsufi.com](http://Kimsufi.com)), I fortunately can reboot it without problem Do you have some idea to fix this issue or to correctly configure ES ? Thanks, Godefroy ---
**Author:** ![Clinton\_Gormley](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/50afbb/32.png) [@Clinton\_Gormley](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Clinton_Gormley)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2010, 7:13pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/2 "2010-12-17T19:13:54Z")
Hiya > But when I try to start ES on a server (Debian), the server totally > freezes and I have to hard-reboot it. What version of Java are you using? If it's not the official Sun Java, you may run into problems (based on my experience with other Java software, like Eclipse) clint ---
**Author:** ![kimchy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/kimchy/32/44952_2.png) [@kimchy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/kimchy)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2010, 7:16pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/3 "2010-12-17T19:16:09Z")
Strange, that its completely crashing the os... . One thing that is done natively now in 0.13 is using mlockall, might be a good try to disable it and see if it helps: [http://www.elasticsearch.com/docs/elasticsearch/setup/installation/#Important\_Configurations](http://www.elasticsearch.com/docs/elasticsearch/setup/installation/#Important_Configurations) . On Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 9:13 PM, Clinton Gormley [clinton@iannounce.co.uk](mailto:clinton@iannounce.co.uk)wrote: > Hiya > > > But when I try to start ES on a server (Debian), the server totally > > freezes and I have to hard-reboot it. > > What version of Java are you using? If it's not the official Sun Java, > you may run into problems (based on my experience with other Java > software, like Eclipse) > > clint ---
**Author:** ![Godefroy\_2](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/godefroy_2/32/3082_2.png) [@Godefroy\_2](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Godefroy_2)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2010, 9:38pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/4 "2010-12-17T21:38:44Z")
Thanks for your answers! I use openjdk-6-jre I just tried with sun-java6-jre and I've the same pb. With bootstrap.mlockall set to false, ES starts ! I have this exception, but ES is usable : Exception in thread "elasticsearch[Jubilee][tp]-pool-1-thread-1" org.elasticsearch.discovery.zen.ping.ZenPingException: Failed to send ping request over multicast Why do ES crashes when bootstrap.mlockall is set to true ? It seems to be dangerous... (It costs me 1 server, and I've lost lot of data) On 17 déc, 20:16, Shay Banon [shay.ba...@elasticsearch.com](mailto:shay.ba...@elasticsearch.com) wrote: > Strange, that its completely crashing the os... . One thing that is done > natively now in 0.13 is using mlockall, might be a good try to disable it > and see if it helps:[http://www.elasticsearch.com/docs/elasticsearch/setup/installation/#I](http://www.elasticsearch.com/docs/elasticsearch/setup/installation/#I)... > . > > On Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 9:13 PM, Clinton Gormley [clin...@iannounce.co.uk](mailto:clin...@iannounce.co.uk)wrote: > > > Hiya > > > > But when I try to start ES on a server (Debian), the server totally > > > freezes and I have to hard-reboot it. > > > What version of Java are you using? If it's not the official Sun Java, > > you may run into problems (based on my experience with other Java > > software, like Eclipse) > > > clint ---
**Author:** ![kimchy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/kimchy/32/44952_2.png) [@kimchy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/kimchy)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2010, 12:24am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/5 "2010-12-19T00:24:16Z")
I am not sure why it crashes to be honest, it just calls mlockall, it shouldn't cause the OS to crash completely. In any case, let me turn this to be off by default, and allow people to turn it on. -shay.banon On Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 11:38 PM, Godefroy [compreignac@gmail.com](mailto:compreignac@gmail.com) wrote: > Thanks for your answers! > > I use openjdk-6-jre > I just tried with sun-java6-jre and I've the same pb. > > With bootstrap.mlockall set to false, ES starts ! > I have this exception, but ES is usable : > Exception in thread "elasticsearch[Jubilee][tp]-pool-1-thread-1" > org.elasticsearch.discovery.zen.ping.ZenPingException: Failed to send > ping request over multicast > > Why do ES crashes when bootstrap.mlockall is set to true ? It seems to > be dangerous... (It costs me 1 server, and I've lost lot of data) > > On 17 déc, 20:16, Shay Banon [shay.ba...@elasticsearch.com](mailto:shay.ba...@elasticsearch.com) wrote: > > > Strange, that its completely crashing the os... . One thing that is done > > natively now in 0.13 is using mlockall, might be a good try to disable it > > and see if it helps: > > [http://www.elasticsearch.com/docs/elasticsearch/setup/installation/#I](http://www.elasticsearch.com/docs/elasticsearch/setup/installation/#I)... > > . > > > > On Fri, Dec 17, 2010 at 9:13 PM, Clinton Gormley \< > > [clin...@iannounce.co.uk](mailto:clin...@iannounce.co.uk)\>wrote: > > > > > Hiya > > > > > > But when I try to start ES on a server (Debian), the server totally > > > > freezes and I have to hard-reboot it. > > > > > What version of Java are you using? If it's not the official Sun Java, > > > you may run into problems (based on my experience with other Java > > > software, like Eclipse) > > > > > clint ---
**Author:** ![Clinton\_Gormley](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/50afbb/32.png) [@Clinton\_Gormley](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Clinton_Gormley)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2010, 11:49am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/6 "2010-12-19T11:49:59Z")
> Why do ES crashes when bootstrap.mlockall is set to true ? It seems to > be dangerous... (It costs me 1 server, and I've lost lot of data) What are your min and max memory settings, and how much memory do you have available on the crashing server? Could it be that you're trying to assign more memory than you have, which causes all of your other processes to swap out? clint ---
**Author:** ![Godefroy\_2](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/godefroy_2/32/3082_2.png) [@Godefroy\_2](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Godefroy_2)\ **Post date:** [December 27, 2010, 11:30pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/7 "2010-12-27T23:30:29Z")
Yes I think that I've not enough memory. But ES should check if there is enough memory before the mlockall, nope ? On 19 déc, 12:49, Clinton Gormley [clin...@iannounce.co.uk](mailto:clin...@iannounce.co.uk) wrote: > > Why do ES crashes when bootstrap.mlockall is set to true ? It seems to > > be dangerous... (It costs me 1 server, and I've lost lot of data) > > What are your min and max memory settings, and how much memory do you > have available on the crashing server? > > Could it be that you're trying to assign more memory than you have, > which causes all of your other processes to swap out? > > clint ---
**Author:** ![ppearcy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/ppearcy/32/980_2.png) [@ppearcy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ppearcy)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2010, 5:14pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/8 "2010-12-28T17:14:25Z")
My two cents... This feature makes ES performance very reliable and fixed some performance spikes that we encountered. I think it should be defaulted to on. It seems to me that the setting only causes problems when misused. Along these same lines, what happens without this setting and someone tries to allocate more mem than their system has and their JVM heap reaches that point? I'd assume massive swapping leading to performance degradation, which would only happen after hours or days of up time. This seems like a ticking time bomb that would be much worse than fail to start up. Best case would be to check system memory before the mlockall call and then gracefully exit with a descriptive error that you don't have enough mem on your system. Btw, this should probably be listed as a breaking change in the 0.14 release notes. Thanks, Paul On Dec 27, 4:30 pm, Godefroy [compreig...@gmail.com](mailto:compreig...@gmail.com) wrote: > Yes I think that I've not enough memory. > But ES should check if there is enough memory before themlockall, > nope ? > > On 19 déc, 12:49, Clinton Gormley [clin...@iannounce.co.uk](mailto:clin...@iannounce.co.uk) wrote: > > > > Why do ES crashes when bootstrap.mlockallis set to true ? It seems to > > > be dangerous... (It costs me 1 server, and I've lost lot of data) > > > What are your min and max memory settings, and how much memory do you > > have available on the crashing server? > > > Could it be that you're trying to assign more memory than you have, > > which causes all of your other processes to swap out? > > > clint ---
**Author:** ![kimchy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/kimchy/32/44952_2.png) [@kimchy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/kimchy)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2010, 6:15pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/9 "2010-12-28T18:15:29Z")
The problem with having this setting set to true is the fact that people have reported that it got to a stage where the OS crashed completely. Not sure why it happened, but ES should not cause that with an out of the box setting. Checking if there is enough memory is a good start, there is no API for that in Java, but can try and use native code, I can play around with it and see how it goes. On Tue, Dec 28, 2010 at 7:14 PM, Paul [ppearcy@gmail.com](mailto:ppearcy@gmail.com) wrote: > My two cents... This feature makes ES performance very reliable and > fixed some performance spikes that we encountered. I think it should > be defaulted to on. > > It seems to me that the setting only causes problems when misused. > Along these same lines, what happens without this setting and someone > tries to allocate more mem than their system has and their JVM heap > reaches that point? I'd assume massive swapping leading to performance > degradation, which would only happen after hours or days of up time. > This seems like a ticking time bomb that would be much worse than fail > to start up. > > Best case would be to check system memory before the mlockall call and > then gracefully exit with a descriptive error that you don't have > enough mem on your system. > > Btw, this should probably be listed as a breaking change in the 0.14 > release notes. > > Thanks, > Paul > > On Dec 27, 4:30 pm, Godefroy [compreig...@gmail.com](mailto:compreig...@gmail.com) wrote: > > > Yes I think that I've not enough memory. > > But ES should check if there is enough memory before themlockall, > > nope ? > > > > On 19 déc, 12:49, Clinton Gormley [clin...@iannounce.co.uk](mailto:clin...@iannounce.co.uk) wrote: > > > > > > Why do ES crashes when bootstrap.mlockallis set to true ? It seems to > > > > be dangerous... (It costs me 1 server, and I've lost lot of data) > > > > > What are your min and max memory settings, and how much memory do you > > > have available on the crashing server? > > > > > Could it be that you're trying to assign more memory than you have, > > > which causes all of your other processes to swap out? > > > > > clint ---
**Author:** ![ppearcy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/ppearcy/32/980_2.png) [@ppearcy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ppearcy)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2010, 6:23pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/10 "2010-12-28T18:23:05Z")
Sigar can provide you this value in Java space with a call to sigar.getMem().getTotal(). Thanks On Dec 28, 11:15 am, Shay Banon [shay.ba...@elasticsearch.com](mailto:shay.ba...@elasticsearch.com) wrote: > The problem with having this setting set to true is the fact that people > have reported that it got to a stage where the OS crashed completely. Not > sure why it happened, but ES should not cause that with an out of the box > setting. Checking if there is enough memory is a good start, there is no API > for that in Java, but can try and use native code, I can play around with it > and see how it goes. > > On Tue, Dec 28, 2010 at 7:14 PM, Paul [ppea...@gmail.com](mailto:ppea...@gmail.com) wrote: > > > My two cents... This feature makes ES performance very reliable and > > fixed some performance spikes that we encountered. I think it should > > be defaulted to on. > > > It seems to me that the setting only causes problems when misused. > > Along these same lines, what happens without this setting and someone > > tries to allocate more mem than their system has and their JVM heap > > reaches that point? I'd assume massive swapping leading to performance > > degradation, which would only happen after hours or days of up time. > > This seems like a ticking time bomb that would be much worse than fail > > to start up. > > > Best case would be to check system memory before the mlockall call and > > then gracefully exit with a descriptive error that you don't have > > enough mem on your system. > > > Btw, this should probably be listed as a breaking change in the 0.14 > > release notes. > > > Thanks, > > Paul > > > On Dec 27, 4:30 pm, Godefroy [compreig...@gmail.com](mailto:compreig...@gmail.com) wrote: > > > > > Yes I think that I've not enough memory. > > > But ES should check if there is enough memory before themlockall, > > > nope ? > > > > On 19 déc, 12:49, Clinton Gormley [clin...@iannounce.co.uk](mailto:clin...@iannounce.co.uk) wrote: > > > > > > Why do ES crashes when bootstrap.mlockallis set to true ? It seems to > > > > > be dangerous... (It costs me 1 server, and I've lost lot of data) > > > > > What are your min and max memory settings, and how much memory do you > > > > have available on the crashing server? > > > > > Could it be that you're trying to assign more memory than you have, > > > > which causes all of your other processes to swap out? > > > > > clint ---
**Author:** ![kimchy](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/kimchy/32/44952_2.png) [@kimchy](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/kimchy)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2010, 6:24pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/11 "2010-12-28T18:24:38Z")
Agreed, thats what I meant when I said going native (ES already uses Sigar) :). Though, total mem might not be enough, but available mem should be checked. On Tue, Dec 28, 2010 at 8:23 PM, Paul [ppearcy@gmail.com](mailto:ppearcy@gmail.com) wrote: > Sigar can provide you this value in Java space with a call to > sigar.getMem().getTotal(). > > Thanks > > On Dec 28, 11:15 am, Shay Banon [shay.ba...@elasticsearch.com](mailto:shay.ba...@elasticsearch.com) wrote: > > > The problem with having this setting set to true is the fact that people > > have reported that it got to a stage where the OS crashed completely. Not > > sure why it happened, but ES should not cause that with an out of the box > > setting. Checking if there is enough memory is a good start, there is no > > API > > for that in Java, but can try and use native code, I can play around with > > it > > and see how it goes. > > > > On Tue, Dec 28, 2010 at 7:14 PM, Paul [ppea...@gmail.com](mailto:ppea...@gmail.com) wrote: > > > > > My two cents... This feature makes ES performance very reliable and > > > fixed some performance spikes that we encountered. I think it should > > > be defaulted to on. > > > > > It seems to me that the setting only causes problems when misused. > > > Along these same lines, what happens without this setting and someone > > > tries to allocate more mem than their system has and their JVM heap > > > reaches that point? I'd assume massive swapping leading to performance > > > degradation, which would only happen after hours or days of up time. > > > This seems like a ticking time bomb that would be much worse than fail > > > to start up. > > > > > Best case would be to check system memory before the mlockall call and > > > then gracefully exit with a descriptive error that you don't have > > > enough mem on your system. > > > > > Btw, this should probably be listed as a breaking change in the 0.14 > > > release notes. > > > > > Thanks, > > > Paul > > > > > On Dec 27, 4:30 pm, Godefroy [compreig...@gmail.com](mailto:compreig...@gmail.com) wrote: > > > > > > > Yes I think that I've not enough memory. > > > > But ES should check if there is enough memory before themlockall, > > > > nope ? > > > > > > On 19 déc, 12:49, Clinton Gormley [clin...@iannounce.co.uk](mailto:clin...@iannounce.co.uk) wrote: > > > > > > > > Why do ES crashes when bootstrap.mlockallis set to true ? It > > > > > > seems to > > > > > > be dangerous... (It costs me 1 server, and I've lost lot of data) > > > > > > > What are your min and max memory settings, and how much memory do > > > > > you > > > > > have available on the crashing server? > > > > > > > Could it be that you're trying to assign more memory than you have, > > > > > which causes all of your other processes to swap out? > > > > > > > clint ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2017, 4:14am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/es-freezes-the-server-at-startup/3676/12 "2017-07-06T04:14:46Z")