[CASSANDRA-2169] user created with debian packaging is unable to increase memlock

• Type: Bug
• Status: Resolved
• Priority: Low
• Resolution: Fixed
• Fix Version/s: 0.7.3
• Component/s: Packaging
• Severity: Low
• Assignee: Jeremy Hanna
• Reporter: Jeremy Hanna

Authors

Jeremy Hanna

Reviewers

Eric Evans

• Created: 15/Feb/11 19:36
• Updated: 16/Apr/19 09:33
• Resolved: 19/Feb/11 22:54

Description

To reproduce:

• Install a fresh copy of ubuntu 10.04.
• Install sun's java6 jdk.
• Install libjna-java 3.2.7 into /usr/share/java.
• Install cassandra 0.7.0 from the apache debian packages.
• Start cassandra using /etc/init.d/cassandra
  In the output.log there will be the following error:

  Unable to lock JVM memory (ENOMEM). This can result in part of the JVM being swapped out, especially with mmapped I/O enabled. Increase RLIMIT_MEMLOCK or run Cassandra as root.

  This shouldn't be as the debian package creates /etc/security/limits.d/cassandra.conf and sets the cassandra user's memlock limit to 'unlimited'.

I tried a variety of things including making the memlock unlimited for all users in /etc/security/limits.conf. I was able to run cassandra using root with jna symbolically linked into /usr/share/cassandra from /usr/share/java, but I could never get the init.d script to work and get beyond that error.

Based on all the trial and error, I think it might have to do with the cassandra user itself, but my debian/ubuntu fu isn't as good as others'.