Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
snip Trying again; last time i tried it was looking like CentOS was going to skip the 5.9 release entirely... It seems it is there now and (so far) has two of the previously missing dependencies... we will see how far i get... --- Erik And that idea crashed and burned badly... After much googling and trying to force-fit the pieces anyway, it quickly became apparent that if I succeeded I would by then be running a Fedora system rather than CentOS; IS team here would have had my hide for breakfast... Next attempt: trying to get a test VM for Ubuntu or Mint; IS team may have my hide just for asking that one... Erik -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
On 04/10/2013 9:21 AM, Erik Soderquist wrote: if I succeeded I would by then be running a Fedora system rather than CentOS; IS team here would have had my hide for breakfast... Next attempt: trying to get a test VM for Ubuntu or Mint; IS team may have my hide just for asking that one... I suppose all of this comes in the name of security ? Sounds like you guys have the IT equivalent of the TSA... (my condolences to you and your colleagues) Ryan -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
On Fri, Oct 4, 2013 at 10:03 AM, Ryan Johnson ryan.john...@cs.utoronto.ca wrote: On 04/10/2013 9:21 AM, Erik Soderquist wrote: if I succeeded I would by then be running a Fedora system rather than CentOS; IS team here would have had my hide for breakfast... Next attempt: trying to get a test VM for Ubuntu or Mint; IS team may have my hide just for asking that one... I suppose all of this comes in the name of security ? Sounds like you guys have the IT equivalent of the TSA... (my condolences to you and your colleagues) Ryan Actually they are quite honest about it being purely policy enforcement and software auditing. We're all network techs here, and are responsible for securing our own systems. --- Erik -- I do not think any of us are truly sane, Caleb. Not even you. Courage is not sanity. Being willing to die for someone else is not sanity. ... Love is not sane, nor is faith. ... If sanity lacks those things, Caleb, I want no part of it. -- Alexandria Terri in Weaving the Wyvern by Alexis Desiree Thorne - http://alexisthorne.webs.com/ -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
On 02/10/2013 7:55 PM, Erik Soderquist wrote: On Wed, Oct 2, 2013 at 6:51 PM, Ryan Johnson ryan.john...@cs.utoronto.ca wrote: I doubt it's an X-server code issue. You tried it on too many machines with problems, and too many other people aren't spamming the list about this, which suggests it's something on your side (like BLODA). Further, the only cygwin bug I've known to cause lots of paging was plugged months ago (it had to do with sparse executable files and should have been irrelevant for this situation anyway). The only (known) BLODA I have from that list is the McAfee A/V-firewall, which I can't remove, but I believe was completely disabled by the above described method. Unfortunately, McAfee is one of the worst offenders in my experience [1]. I seriously doubt you can disable it completely from user space, given its habits of interposing on device drivers and burrowing into other kernel bits [2]. [1] IMO it's a cure that's worse than the disease, but that's a rant for a different thread. [2] McAfee actually sued MS for anticompetitive behavior a while back, after the latter closed a bunch of security loopholes in the kernel that virus-writers love but McAfee also depended on (including the interrupt dispatch table IIRC). My advice: check out the cygwin FAQ about BLODA, uninstall anything listed there (or install a fresh VM image somewhere without those) and try again. If it's still a problem, somebody more familiar with X than me will have to take over... If I can get the authorization for a VM test without A/V, I will and the results will be posted here either way. Thank you for your time in looking at this. Good luck! Ryan -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
snip The only (known) BLODA I have from that list is the McAfee A/V-firewall, which I can't remove, but I believe was completely disabled by the above described method. Unfortunately, McAfee is one of the worst offenders in my experience [1]. I seriously doubt you can disable it completely from user space, given its habits of interposing on device drivers and burrowing into other kernel bits [2]. [1] IMO it's a cure that's worse than the disease, but that's a rant for a different thread. [2] McAfee actually sued MS for anticompetitive behavior a while back, after the latter closed a bunch of security loopholes in the kernel that virus-writers love but McAfee also depended on (including the interrupt dispatch table IIRC). ... So fixing security failures is 'anticompetitive' in McAfee's book?? Wow... That is the kind of business that if i had the funds I would buy just to dismantle... I knew they were bad but didn't know they were *that* bad. snip there (or install a fresh VM image somewhere without those) and try again. If it's still a problem, somebody more familiar with X than me will have to take over... If I can get the authorization for a VM test without A/V, I will and the results will be posted here either way. Thank you for your time in looking at this. Good luck! Ryan Installed a fresh VM with a Windows XP 64 bit ISO, sp2 already applied. VM has 512 MB ram, and the only package I installed after the OS was cygwin. Issue presents in this environment as soon as Firefox connects/starts. Page Faults Delta over 5,000 minimum anytime I'm doing anything in Firefox, including typing this message, usually over 10,000. Then I went to the services applet and started disabling anything not needed to run the X server and get the connection to/from the remote host. Once nearly everything was disabled, i rebooted the VM. Currently there are only four Windows services running. They are: CYGWIN sshd, DHCP Client, Plug and Play, and Remote Procedure Call (RPC). Issue still presents. I've attached the XWin log and the cygcheck output from the VM. --- Erik vm_XWin.4.log Description: Binary data vm_cygcheck.out Description: Binary data -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
snip Installed a fresh VM with a Windows XP 64 bit ISO, sp2 already applied. VM has 512 MB ram, and the only package I installed after the OS was cygwin. snip Followup: I confirmed that my VM host's environment's memory setting is set to lock all VM guest memory into physical ram, and doubled the VM's ram. No difference in results, issue still presents. --- Erik -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
On 03/10/2013 11:44 AM, Erik Soderquist wrote: Installed a fresh VM with a Windows XP 64 bit ISO, sp2 already applied. VM has 512 MB ram, and the only package I installed after the OS was cygwin. Issue presents in this environment as soon as Firefox connects/starts. Page Faults Delta over 5,000 minimum anytime I'm doing anything in Firefox, including typing this message, usually over 10,000. I just fired up a 64-bit Ubuntu VM I had laying around, installed firefox, and tunneled it to cygwin64/X on my win7-64 machine. X isn't even visible in the task manager when I sort descending by PF delta, CPU, or memory. This in spite of having half a dozen tabs with content (including ads, an html5 game, and a youtube video playing). Opening a couple dozen more empty tabs brought PFdelta up to the ~7k range, but the rate dropped back to ~0 as soon as the dust settled. Typing remains fully responsive, and I'm officially out of ideas. Ryan -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
snip I just fired up a 64-bit Ubuntu VM I had laying around, installed firefox, and tunneled it to cygwin64/X on my win7-64 machine. X isn't even visible in the task manager when I sort descending by PF delta, CPU, or memory. This in spite of having half a dozen tabs with content (including ads, an html5 game, and a youtube video playing). Opening a couple dozen more empty tabs brought PFdelta up to the ~7k range, but the rate dropped back to ~0 as soon as the dust settled. Typing remains fully responsive, and I'm officially out of ideas. Ryan That is the kind of responsiveness I expect, and what other people I've discussed this with experience, which is why I think it is something unusual in my setup or environment... Unfortunately, I'm currently unable to find it myself, and can reliably reproduce the issue even in a virgin environment. So far, the only common factors (that I see) across each of these has been my Linux host, (CentOS 5.8 at present) and my various tabs/accounts. However, I am at a complete loss as to even guess at how these could affect page faulting on the X server. For reference: on the Linux host, when the Windows host is experiencing these page faults, the Linux host is reporting 20-30% CPU usage overall, no swap usage. --- Erik -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
On 03/10/2013 12:27 PM, Ryan Johnson wrote: On 03/10/2013 11:44 AM, Erik Soderquist wrote: Installed a fresh VM with a Windows XP 64 bit ISO, sp2 already applied. VM has 512 MB ram, and the only package I installed after the OS was cygwin. Issue presents in this environment as soon as Firefox connects/starts. Page Faults Delta over 5,000 minimum anytime I'm doing anything in Firefox, including typing this message, usually over 10,000. I just fired up a 64-bit Ubuntu VM I had laying around, installed firefox, and tunneled it to cygwin64/X on my win7-64 machine. X isn't even visible in the task manager when I sort descending by PF delta, CPU, or memory. This in spite of having half a dozen tabs with content (including ads, an html5 game, and a youtube video playing). Opening a couple dozen more empty tabs brought PFdelta up to the ~7k range, but the rate dropped back to ~0 as soon as the dust settled. Typing remains fully responsive, and I'm officially out of ideas. Huh. I have 1.14.3, not 1.14.2... have you tried upgrading just in case that's the issue? Ryan -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
snip Huh. I have 1.14.3, not 1.14.2... have you tried upgrading just in case that's the issue? Ryan The virgin XP-64 VM is using 1.14.3, issue still presents. --- Erik -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
On 10/3/2013 12:46 PM, Erik Soderquist wrote: snip I just fired up a 64-bit Ubuntu VM I had laying around, installed firefox, and tunneled it to cygwin64/X on my win7-64 machine. X isn't even visible in the task manager when I sort descending by PF delta, CPU, or memory. This in spite of having half a dozen tabs with content (including ads, an html5 game, and a youtube video playing). Opening a couple dozen more empty tabs brought PFdelta up to the ~7k range, but the rate dropped back to ~0 as soon as the dust settled. Typing remains fully responsive, and I'm officially out of ideas. Ryan That is the kind of responsiveness I expect, and what other people I've discussed this with experience, which is why I think it is something unusual in my setup or environment... Unfortunately, I'm currently unable to find it myself, and can reliably reproduce the issue even in a virgin environment. So far, the only common factors (that I see) across each of these has been my Linux host, (CentOS 5.8 at present) and my various tabs/accounts. However, I am at a complete loss as to even guess at how these could affect page faulting on the X server. For reference: on the Linux host, when the Windows host is experiencing these page faults, the Linux host is reporting 20-30% CPU usage overall, no swap usage. Any chance of finding or setting up an alternate host to test against? -- Larry _ A: Yes. Q: Are you sure? A: Because it reverses the logical flow of conversation. Q: Why is top posting annoying in email? -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
On Thu, Oct 3, 2013 at 3:27 PM, Erik Soderquist erik.soderqu...@gmail.com wrote: snip Similar, to but different from Larry's suggestion, can you install Firefox on CentOS using the installer from Firefox itself, and not the distro version? I can imagine it could be something about flags or settings they used when compiling it. Jack I tried a couple times, and am willing to try again; however, I have not been able to resolve dependency conflicts to get a current version of Firefox to successfully install, let alone run. I fear this may have to wait for the host to be wiped and reloaded. Even then, I don't know what level of success I'll have, as currently it looks like it will be reloaded with CentOS 6. RHEL/CentOS are known for keeping solid and stable, not current... --- Erik Trying again; last time i tried it was looking like CentOS was going to skip the 5.9 release entirely... It seems it is there now and (so far) has two of the previously missing dependencies... we will see how far i get... --- Erik -- I do not think any of us are truly sane, Caleb. Not even you. Courage is not sanity. Being willing to die for someone else is not sanity. ... Love is not sane, nor is faith. ... If sanity lacks those things, Caleb, I want no part of it. -- Alexandria Terri in Weaving the Wyvern by Alexis Desiree Thorne - http://alexisthorne.webs.com/ -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
On 02/10/2013 2:50 PM, Erik Soderquist wrote: I am currently using the X server on a Windows 7 64 bit host for Firefox (in particular, occasional terminals too). While everything works, I am experiencing very severe memory page faulting causing the graphical interface to appear to hang for several seconds at a time, and when not appearing hung, responsiveness is very painfully slow, sometimes to the extent that I will type a paragraph and then sit back and watch as the graphical interface slowly displays what I typed at a rate of 1-2 characters per second. Is there really a Firefox build for cygwin/X ? Or are you tunneling from some other machine? Testing with antivirus and firewall enabled/disabled did not affect the results. (faq reference http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/cygwin-x-faq.html#poor-performance found during searches). If antivirus is a problem (as in BLODA), you probably need to uninstall, not just disable. They're usually too lazy to actually remove their hooks when off and just (try to) make the hooks become (mostly) no-ops instead. Not saying it's your problem, necessarily, just that merely disabling AV is not enough to rule it out. Also (not necessarily related to this particular problem), cygcheck reports a surprising selection of *nix-like utilities in c:\windows\bin. Whatever they are, they can't be helping. I doubt it's an X-server code issue. You tried it on too many machines with problems, and too many other people aren't spamming the list about this, which suggests it's something on your side (like BLODA). Further, the only cygwin bug I've known to cause lots of paging was plugged months ago (it had to do with sparse executable files and should have been irrelevant for this situation anyway). My advice: check out the cygwin FAQ about BLODA, uninstall anything listed there (or install a fresh VM image somewhere without those) and try again. If it's still a problem, somebody more familiar with X than me will have to take over... Ryan -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
Re: Xwin 1.14.2 (64 bit) extreme memory page faulting
On Wed, Oct 2, 2013 at 6:51 PM, Ryan Johnson ryan.john...@cs.utoronto.ca wrote: On 02/10/2013 2:50 PM, Erik Soderquist wrote: I am currently using the X server on a Windows 7 64 bit host for Firefox (in particular, occasional terminals too). snip Is there really a Firefox build for cygwin/X ? Or are you tunneling from some other machine? My apologies; Firefox is running on a CentOS host and I have tried both raw X and tunneled through ssh. I am currently tunneling though ssh as the raw X was a test only to see if it was a tunnel issue. Testing with antivirus and firewall enabled/disabled did not affect the results. (faq reference http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/cygwin-x-faq.html#poor-performance found during searches). If antivirus is a problem (as in BLODA), you probably need to uninstall, not just disable. They're usually too lazy to actually remove their hooks when off and just (try to) make the hooks become (mostly) no-ops instead. Not saying it's your problem, necessarily, just that merely disabling AV is not enough to rule it out. Unfortunately, uninstall is not an option for me. Corporate Policy prevents it on several levels. However, my disable of the A/V-firewall packages was by going into the Windows Services applets and disabling the services there and via a couple registry hacks and then rebooting so the A/V and firewall pieces could not load to start with. They are as ruled out as I can make them currently. I will look into the possibility of a VM to test without them entirely and see if i can still reproduce the issue. Also (not necessarily related to this particular problem), cygcheck reports a surprising selection of *nix-like utilities in c:\windows\bin. Whatever they are, they can't be helping. Those existed only on the current test machine. In theory, since they are later in the path in the cygwin environment, they should never be executed unless called by full path, but I do appreciate it being pointed out. I should have mentioned their existence on this machine to start with. I doubt it's an X-server code issue. You tried it on too many machines with problems, and too many other people aren't spamming the list about this, which suggests it's something on your side (like BLODA). Further, the only cygwin bug I've known to cause lots of paging was plugged months ago (it had to do with sparse executable files and should have been irrelevant for this situation anyway). The only (known) BLODA I have from that list is the McAfee A/V-firewall, which I can't remove, but I believe was completely disabled by the above described method. My advice: check out the cygwin FAQ about BLODA, uninstall anything listed there (or install a fresh VM image somewhere without those) and try again. If it's still a problem, somebody more familiar with X than me will have to take over... Ryan If I can get the authorization for a VM test without A/V, I will and the results will be posted here either way. Thank you for your time in looking at this. --- Erik -- Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html Documentation: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/ FAQ: http://x.cygwin.com/docs/faq/
