Database Size

We are experiencing a large number of system memory errors that cause the users DOORS session to hang up or crash.

Can anyone tell me if there are any limits (or recommendations) regarding database size. Our DB is currently over 26 gig. I thought perhaps we were approaching some sort of limit.

If the DB size is not an issue, any other ideas would be appreciated. We work in a citrix enviroment with about 20 users per client server at any given time. We are running DO0RS 9.203 and Windows 2003 SR2.

Lee
leefarmer - Wed Sep 07 15:26:12 EDT 2011

Re: Database Size
SystemAdmin - Thu Sep 08 10:38:59 EDT 2011

Pretty sure you are nowhere near any "Max Size" number. Our largest DOORS server is getting up over 900 GB, so it's not that. You probably do need to get up to the newest version of the server and client though. We're in the process of getting 9.3.0.4 out to our users right now. 9.3.0.4 does seem to address some of those issues - especially with regards to Microsoft Word.

You might also want to look into what we call "RTF Attributes". There is a link here to get you started : https://www-304.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21422988

Re: Database Size
SystemAdmin - Fri Sep 09 10:49:01 EDT 2011

Lee,

I would chime in that the db size is not the issue here. ours is slightly over 74 Gig on a 150 GB server.

Our experience with memory issues and client crashes points to the DOORS clients ram size and type of DOORS user and module specific contents.
eg. some of our larger modules can require 700+ megabytes of pc client ram when being opened to be worked on and thus the pc better have RAM memory in place to support this. Some of our older Windows XP boxes with less than 1.5GB ram would bog down badly. Our power users, Database Manager User typically are getting 3GB ram pc's and also Windows XP 64 bit pc's that accept more RAM than the 32 bit pc's which max out at 3 GB ram.

Bottom Line: i would suspect you need to address the way that the Citrix server is doling out its ram to each DOORS session and go from there...

gsdguy

Re: Database Size
Bjoern_Karpenstein - Wed Jul 01 02:50:31 EDT 2015

Hi Lee Farmer!

We have the same problem like you, yesterday we had an IBM consultant here who told us that our size of 40 GByte and 30 users could be problematic.

He tries to clearify this internal.

BTW we have currently Windows Server 2003 SP2 running - do you have solved this problem meanwhile?

It would be very nice to get some infromation from you.

Re: Database Size
llandale - Mon Jul 06 18:05:49 EDT 2015

"Session" crashes are due to limits on the DOORS client memory; has nothing to do with the DOORS service or size of the database.  that's completely different from DOOR service crashes.

DOORS client runs out of memory for two main reasons:

  1. Too many modules are open.  Since nobody in their right mind is going to open manually 100 large modules, this problem is also due to poorly written DXL running.
  2. DXL running is grossly inefficient when it comes to string table space.

It seems likely that you have poorly written Attr-DXL or Layout DXL in default views for modules.  Althernatively your DXL could be reasonable but you have so much intra-module cross linking that lots of modules must be open.  In any case, try to use the Explorer Tools menu >Manage open modules.. and see how many modules are actually loaded in your client.

Poorly written DXL can exhause memory space.

  • string A
  • for (i=0; i<1000; i++)  A = A "x"

You end up with a string of 1000 "x"s but waste 500K memory in wasted strings; x, xx, xxx, xxxx.  String concatenation (A "X" above) within a big loop is the problem.

  • Buffer b = create
  • string A
  • for (I=0; I<1000; I++) b += "x"
  • A = stringOf(b)
  • delete(b)

The Buffer removes the concatenation and you waste 1001 byes of string table.

Unless you know you are running huge on-demand scripts, the likely culrprit again is sloppy Attr-DXL or Layout-DXL; or of course Triggers.

-Louie