[SPARK-3721] Broadcast Variables above 2GB break in PySpark

• Type: Bug
• Status: Resolved
• Priority: Major
• Resolution: Fixed
• Affects Version/s: 1.1.0
• Fix Version/s: 1.2.0
• Component/s: PySpark
• Assignee: Davies Liu
• Reporter: Brad Miller
• Created: 29/Sep/14 15:49
• Updated: 19/Nov/14 00:18
• Resolved: 19/Nov/14 00:18

Description

The bug displays 3 unique failure modes in PySpark, all of which seem to be related to broadcast variable size. Note that the tests below ran python 2.7.3 on all machines and used the Spark 1.1.0 binaries.

*BLOCK 1* [no problem]

import cPickle
from pyspark import SparkContext

def check_pre_serialized(size):
    msg = cPickle.dumps(range(2 ** size))
    print 'serialized length:', len(msg)
    bvar = sc.broadcast(msg)
    print 'length recovered from broadcast variable:', len(bvar.value)
    print 'correct value recovered:', msg == bvar.value
    bvar.unpersist()    

def check_unserialized(size):
    msg = range(2 ** size)
    bvar = sc.broadcast(msg)
    print 'correct value recovered:', msg == bvar.value
    bvar.unpersist()

SparkContext.setSystemProperty('spark.executor.memory', '15g')
SparkContext.setSystemProperty('spark.cores.max', '5')
sc = SparkContext('spark://crosby.research.intel-research.net:7077', 'broadcast_bug')

*BLOCK 2* [no problem]

check_pre_serialized(20)
> serialized length: 9374656
> length recovered from broadcast variable: 9374656
> correct value recovered: True

*BLOCK 3* [no problem]

check_unserialized(20)
> correct value recovered: True

*BLOCK 4* [no problem]

check_pre_serialized(27)
> serialized length: 1499501632
> length recovered from broadcast variable: 1499501632
> correct value recovered: True

*BLOCK 5* [no problem]

check_unserialized(27)
> correct value recovered: True

*BLOCK 6* *[ERROR 1: unhandled error from cPickle.dumps inside sc.broadcast]*

check_pre_serialized(28)
.....
> /home/spark/greatest/python/pyspark/serializers.py in dumps(self, obj)
>     354
>     355     def dumps(self, obj):
> --> 356         return cPickle.dumps(obj, 2)
>     357
>     358     loads = cPickle.loads
>
> SystemError: error return without exception set

*BLOCK 7* [no problem]

check_unserialized(28)
> correct value recovered: True

*BLOCK 8* *[ERROR 2: no error occurs and *incorrect result* is returned]*

check_pre_serialized(29)
> serialized length: 6331339840
> length recovered from broadcast variable: 2036372544
> correct value recovered: False

*BLOCK 9* *[ERROR 3: unhandled error from zlib.compress inside sc.broadcast]*

check_unserialized(29)
......
> /home/spark/greatest/python/pyspark/serializers.py in dumps(self, obj)
>     418 
>     419     def dumps(self, obj):
> --> 420         return zlib.compress(self.serializer.dumps(obj), 1)
>     421 
>     422     def loads(self, obj):
> 
> OverflowError: size does not fit in an int

*BLOCK 10* [ERROR 1]

check_pre_serialized(30)
...same as above...

*BLOCK 11* [ERROR 3]

check_unserialized(30)
...same as above...

Issue Links

• links to: [Github] Pull Request #2659 (davies)