Linux problem

[Jay Vaughan]

> The problem is that the machine is really busy, and now crashes very
> regularly. That it's busy is not something that we can fix right away
> (we'd have to invest in new hardware, which takes money that we don't
> necessarily have), but why is it crashing? Isn't Unix, and by  
> extension
> Linux, supposed to be stable?
>

Sure is.  So something is wrong.

> What happens is that some operation in httpd or exim causes a 'null
> pointer' fault in the kernel, and then the whole thing goes. Or some
> mysql query won't finish and takes up all processing time,  
> requiring us
> to do a 'kill -9' on mysqld.
>


How do you know these things?  Full details please.

> Is there anything simple we can do to solve this problem? My solution
> would be to install Solaris, but you know, that's not my decision  
> to make.
>


Its a bit shallow to expect a solution to this highly frustrating  
problem without at least a few *.log files to get a better, bigger  
picture of whats going on .. Got any weird modules loaded?  Lots of  
linux-based ISP's load their own crap in to monitor your activities,  
etc.  Whats the RAM like?  Whats the RAM usage like?  What sort of  
hardware is in it?  Lots of things could be causing a kernel panic -  
most likely its either really, a bad hardware setup, some bogus  
module, or something not quite well-configured ..

;
--
Jay Vaughan