[cobalt-users] limit memory utilization of a user ( &Kernel 2.2.19 on RAQ3 / RAQ4)

[Samuel Dupas <samuel@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hello,

[quick]

If someone have an idea of the way to limit total memory utilization (and
especially virtual memory) of a user, don't be shy, please share your
informations with me :-)

(I was thinking about "ulimit" but it's per process and not per user ...)

thanks

[Long]

I have a server that is running the kernel 2.2.16
It crashed twice because of a bug in the kernel
When this bug happens you have "do_try_to_free_pages failed for XXX" in
/var/log/messages

This bug is corrected in the kernel 2.2.19 (and not before ...)
Unfortunately, Cobalt didn't release this kernel yet) That's why I was
working on the compilation of the kernel 2.2.19 on a cobalt.

I was able to compile it with applying some patches to keep specific
cobalt functions (LCD panel, temperature detection etc.)

I ran tests during more than 48 hours, I supposed it was working when it
crashed again.
However, the messages in /var/log/messages are not the same :
"VM killing process XXX"
So, I don't know if it's still a bug of the kernel or something else.

I was thinking about limiting the virtual memory utilization of a user (I
mean the httpd user for example) in order to avoid that the kernel try to
shoot some processes randomly . Because, it might have shot klogd as well
so I had no others messages ...

If someone have an idea of the way to limit total memory utilization of a
user, I am interrested.
(I was thinking about "ulimit" but it's per process and not per user ...)

Or others ideas about the situation ???

Thanks

Samuel