Re: ldbm database usage

[Juan Carlos Gomez <gomez@cthulhu.engr.sgi.com>]

David Boreham wrote:

> "MCGARRAHAN, KENNETH L (SWBT)" wrote:
>
> > Though our use of OpenLDAP might be atypical, our LDAP server might be hit
> > with something on the order of 6000 database additions and deletions (~3000
> > each) per day. It appears that the resultant id2entry.?dbm file might be
> > growing in size over time, even if the total number of entries served by the
> > database is fairly constant (currently at 5000 entries).
> >
> > It is unclear to me whether an ldbm back-end should/must be rebuilt
> > periodically to reclaim index and/or data space.  Anyone with first hand
> > experience? Care to share your knowledge?
>
> The files should exhibit "high watermark" behavior.
>
> That is, when new data is added, space taken up
> by deleted entries will be used until there's no
> more left. Then the file is extended. So the files
> will grow to reflect the maximum amount of data
> which resided in the server at any point in the past.
> Files can never be shrunk, unless they're deleted
> and recreated.
>
> In your scenario, where entries are being
> added and deleted such that the total content
> is relatively constant, the size of the files
> should not grow without constraint*.
>
> --
> *Actually the secondary index files probably
> will grow unless open-ldap now deletes index keys.
> The primary index (id2entry) should not grow
> unbounded.

  I suggested this to be fixed but got some opposition to it
I will try it though and if it works probably it will become an option in our
ldbm backend