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From: lindsay@dscatl.UUCP (Lindsay Cleveland)
Newsgroups: news.admin
Subject: Re: --- Multiple UUXQTs causing thrashing ---
Message-ID: <1426@dscatl.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 17-Oct-87 23:02:40 EDT
Article-I.D.: dscatl.1426
Posted: Sat Oct 17 23:02:40 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 18-Oct-87 23:04:49 EDT
References: <173@zap.UUCP>
Organization: Digital Systems Co., Atlanta, Ga.
Lines: 64
Keywords: Unix, compress, LCK.XQT, thrashing

In article <173@zap.UUCP>, fortin@zap.UUCP (Denis Fortin) writes:
> 	I have recently installed News 2.11 on my system (an 
> iAPX286 machine running Microport System V/AT 2.2L), and have
> arranged a full compressed newsfeed with one of my neighbors.  Everything 
> works fine except that I have noticed a few times that the unpacking of
> the news seemed to take (much) longer than usual, and on top of that,
> the response time of the system was really rotten.  A quick "ps -ef"
> informed me that no less than three UUXQTs were running on the system,
> each one with associated news-unpack, compress, etc.
> 
I have the identical setup and also do a full feed to two
additional sites.

The trick is to move the processing from UUXQT, which occurs when
the stuff arrives, to something which *you* control.

My technique is to have the following in /usr/bin/rnews (the place
where UUXQT will find it):

  #  This pseudo-"rnews" program copies the standard input
  #  into a queue directory for processing at a later time.
  # 
  # NOTE: the SAVEDIR's higher directory must have
  # permissions/ownership such that this program can do the "mkdir".
  SPOOLDIR=/usr/spool/news
  SAVEDIR=$SPOOLDIR/.rnews
  OWNER=news
  
  if [ ! -d $SPOOLDIR ] 
   then mkdir $SPOOLDIR; chmod 777 $SPOOLDIR; chown $OWNER $SPOOLDIR
  fi
  
  if [ ! -d $SAVEDIR ] 
   then mkdir $SAVEDIR; chmod 777 $SAVEDIR; chown $OWNER $SAVEDIR
  fi
  
  # Make file name from year/month/day/hour/min/sec/PID
  FILENM=`date '+%y%m%d%H%M%S'``expr "00$$" : '.*\(..\)'`
  
  # Store the stdin into the file for processing by the local system.
  cat - > $SAVEDIR/$FILENM 
  chmod 666 $SAVEDIR/$FILENM
  
  #  Force a zero return code
  exit 0
  
  
Using "crontab", you then have "/usr/lib/rnews -U" invoked whenever
you wish (such as in the wee hours when you're not using the
system).  It will wander down the /usr/spool/news/.rnews directory
and process the articles in the order they were received.  By spacing
the running of it judiciously, (or with your own interlocking technique,
or by using "batch", or whatever), you will usually have only one "rnews"
running on your system.

There are other techniques, but this one is reasonably
straightforward.  Hope it helps.

Cheers,
  Lindsay

Lindsay Cleveland         Digital Systems Co.   Atlanta, Ga
  gatech!dscatl!lindsay     (404) 497-1902
                         (U.S. Mail:  PO Box 1140, Duluth, GA  3