CF10 Update 14 and possible memory issues

[dpstucson]

One of my associates is complaining that since I applied the Coldfusion 10 Update 14 we are experiencing memory issues.  Has anyone else had issues with Update 14?

Just a System Admin fighting the good fight!

[Carl Von Stetten]

That's rather vague.  Can you provide specifics about the "memory issues"?  Are you seeing performance impacts or actual errors?  If the latter, can you provide stack traces?  What operating system (and version) are you using, and what version of Java?

[dpstucson]

I know its vague as it is just a general question.  I was just putting feelers out to see if anyone else is experiencing issues with the latest update.

[Carl Von Stetten]

Most of the issues I've heard about are as Anit suggested - they are related to the IIS web connectors.  I can't recall seeing any complaints here, in other forums, or on Twitter with regard to memory issues.

One thing Update 14 provides is Java 8 compatibility.  What version of Java are you running?

[dpstucson]

v1.7.0_15

[Carl Von Stetten]

I would definitely consider upgrading to a more recent JVM version (the current one is 1.7.0_71).  There were some issues with earlier versions that might impact memory performance.

[Anit_Kumar]

There are issues with ColdFusion 10 Update 14, only if you are behind a lockdown environment. You can refer to Resolving "500 Internal Server Error" with ColdFusion 10 Update 14 — Adobe ColdFusion Blog for more info.

Regards,

Anit Kumar

[davecordes]

Hi,

We are experiencing the same thing. Our servers were performing wonderfully before the patch and now CPU and memory are both sky high and will not come back down. When I do a manual garbage collection in Fusion Reactor hardly any memory is released. There is definitely something going on with this patch. I am thinking about downgrading to update 13 and see what happens.

Here are my specs:

Server 1

- Windows Server 2008 R2

- ColdFusion 10, Update 14

- Java 1.7.67

Server 2

- Windows Server 2008 R2

- ColdFusion 10, Update 14

- Java 1.8.25

[Chad_Matthews]

Before opening a new thread - we are seeing similar issues.

We are running CF 10 - installed patch 13 and 14 and now the Java heap sizes grows continuously.  Garbage collection is not making much of a difference even when run manually.

We used to run Heap size at 2GB on patch 12 without issue.

Now on Patch 14 - we are running out of heap memory even with a new setting of 8GB.

The heap never stops growing.  Heap Size grows non-stop until CPU 100% and causes outage.  It takes about 1-2 days for this to happen.

Only change was the CF 13 and 14 patch.

[Carl Von Stetten]

Which Garbage Collection method are you using?  Have you tried using the G1GC method?  Don't know if it will solve your particular problem, but it did improve performance on my servers.

-Carl V.

[carl type3]

Hi Folks,

Agree with Carl V - good outcomes using G1GC. Particularly with Java 1.7u55 and above. Also trialled Java 1.8u25 as well to good effect.

One would do well to perform some Java logging to know how well the heap, non heap and garbage collections are going before making changes then after G1GC change.

HTH, Carl M.

[Charlie Arehart]

I’ll throw in that even if changing the JVM helped, it would still leave the question open as to whether/why Chad experienced a change in heap usage on solely updating CF.

Chad, really? Nothing else changed? I just find that so odd. I’ve not yet heard about it (or seen it) being an issue. Of course, update 14 did do quite a bit: beyond bug fixes it also updated Tomcat. I would be surprised that that could lead to memory leaks (assuming that’s what this is, if really NOTHING else changed).

What about the database you’re using? Update 14 did change the JDBC drivers for Postgres. Are you using that DBMS?

Just trying to think what else could contribute to this, if indeed nothing else changed for you.

It is possible that something else changed, either in the config or coding (and you didn’t know it), or perhaps in the load against the server (I see that all the time: someone adds a new site, perhaps brought over from another server, and they assume “it doesn’t get much traffic”, but they don’t realize how heavily spiders and bots may hit that newly added site, which could definitely put pressure on the heap whether from increased sessions, caching, and so on.)

Of course, you can always uninstall the update easily, in the same CF Admin page where you install it. That would help you prove if that alone was it. (Just be sure to rebuild the connectors back to the version as per the CF update you would revert to. I don’t think it’s appropriate to run the update 14 connector with an earlier update.)

Finally, FWIW, if you really wanted to go nuts, you could change CF to using Java 8. That’s another thing added in 14: support of 8. But to clear, it does not “change it” for you, so that’s not what happened here. But just as the two Carl’s proposed changing the JVM to see if it “would help”, you could consider moving to Java 8. That’s all the more worth considering if indeed the issue is that something changed in your environment (config/code/load) and you simply do need more heap (in Java 7).

Of course CF will use the same GC you have specified even if you update it to use 8, so you may need to make some changes to see a real impact. But for instance one thing Java 8 does by default is no longer use the permanent generation. That should have no effect on your your observed use of heap. Just saying that 8 is indeed different, and you never know if updating to it could help (or hurt. It’s so new that CF supports it in 10, and only to come in update 3 of 11, that there’s relatively little known experience about the combination.)

Anyway, do let us know if you find more.

/charlie