COMMENTS ON THE CONFIGURATION OF APACHE FOR LARGE SITES
-----------------------------------------------------
(File last updated on 25/October/2012)

If you have a large site, for instance with more than 50 teams, then
the best practice is to decrease the number of threads/servers that
apache starts (yes, I said to DECREASE). The problem is that the computers 
are not so powerful, and apache is usually configured with too many of them. 
If there are too many requests, instead of queuing them, apache tries to 
answer all in parallel, and the server suffers a lot. This can be changed in the
/etc/apache2/apache.conf file, as below (well, the exact values to use
depend on your site, the original config has too high numbers):


# prefork MPM
# StartServers: number of server processes to start
# MinSpareServers: minimum number of server processes which are kept spare
# MaxSpareServers: maximum number of server processes which are kept spare
# MaxClients: maximum number of server processes allowed to start
# MaxRequestsPerChild: maximum number of requests a server process serves
<IfModule mpm_prefork_module>
    StartServers          3
    MinSpareServers       3
    MaxSpareServers      6
    MaxClients          40
    MaxRequestsPerChild   0
</IfModule>

# worker MPM
# StartServers: initial number of server processes to start
# MinSpareThreads: minimum number of worker threads which are kept spare
# MaxSpareThreads: maximum number of worker threads which are kept spare
# ThreadLimit: ThreadsPerChild can be changed to this maximum value during a
#              graceful restart. ThreadLimit can only be changed by stopping
#              and starting Apache.
# ThreadsPerChild: constant number of worker threads in each server process
# MaxClients: maximum number of simultaneous client connections
# MaxRequestsPerChild: maximum number of requests a server process serves
<IfModule mpm_worker_module>
    StartServers          2
    MinSpareThreads      10
    MaxSpareThreads      30
    ThreadLimit          32
    ThreadsPerChild      10
    MaxClients          40
    MaxRequestsPerChild   0
</IfModule>

# event MPM
# StartServers: initial number of server processes to start
# MinSpareThreads: minimum number of worker threads which are kept spare
# MaxSpareThreads: maximum number of worker threads which are kept spare
# ThreadsPerChild: constant number of worker threads in each server process
# MaxClients: maximum number of simultaneous client connections
# MaxRequestsPerChild: maximum number of requests a server process serves
<IfModule mpm_event_module>
    StartServers          2
    MinSpareThreads      10
    MaxSpareThreads      30
    ThreadLimit          32
    ThreadsPerChild      10
    MaxClients          40
    MaxRequestsPerChild   0
</IfModule>



Contacts and Copyrights
-----------------------
BOCA Copyright (c) 2003- Cassio Polpo de Campos (cassio@ime.usp.br)
http://www.ime.usp.br/~cassio/boca

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