Upstart init process consuming all ram

[Leonardo Corato]

In Ubuntu 14.04 amd64 Upstart init process keeps growing in ram.
It's about 0.1 MiB every 10s.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04
Package: upstart 1.12.1-0ubuntu4
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-24.46-generic 3.13.9
Uname: Linux 3.13.0-24-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.14.1-0ubuntu3
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: Unity
Date: Thu Apr 24 10:33:58 2014
InstallationDate: Installed on 2011-09-05 (961 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.10 "Oneiric Ocelot" - Beta amd64 (20110901)
ProcKernelCmdline: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-3.13.0-24-generic root=/dev/mapper/hostname-root ro quiet splash zswap.enabled=1 crashkernel=384M-:128M crashkernel=384M-:128M crashkernel=384M-:128M crashkernel=384M-:128M
SourcePackage: upstart
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to trusty on 2014-02-07 (75 days ago)
UpstartBugCategory: System
UpstartRunningSessionVersion: init (upstart 1.12.1)
UpstartRunningSystemVersion: init (upstart 1.12.1)
modified.conffile..etc.NetworkManager.NetworkManager.conf: [modified]
modified.conffile..etc.at.deny: [inaccessible: [Errno 13] Permission denied: '/etc/at.deny']
modified.conffile..etc.dconf.db.gdm: [modified]
modified.conffile..etc.default.cups: [modified]
modified.conffile..etc.default.whoopsie: [modified]
modified.conffile..etc.iscsi.iscsid.conf: [modified]
mtime.conffile..etc.NetworkManager.NetworkManager.conf: 2013-12-20T12:14:24.844783
mtime.conffile..etc.dconf.db.gdm: 2014-02-21T11:46:26.072553
mtime.conffile..etc.default.cups: 2014-03-11T16:01:34.805892
mtime.conffile..etc.default.whoopsie: 2013-10-23T11:36:50.678661
mtime.conffile..etc.iscsi.iscsid.conf: 2013-07-10T17:05:34.637955

[Leonardo Corato (leocor)]

It's a regression as it did't happen in Ubuntu 13.10 om the same machine.

[James Hunt (jamesodhunt)]

Can you confirm that you are talking about PID 1? How are you checking the amount of memory init is using?

Also, do you have a /var/log/upstart/ directory on your system?

[Leonardo Corato (leocor)]

Sorry James, I checked and PID is not(!) 1. So it is a "init --user". I am
checking now with System Monitor, befeore I checked with top command and I
messed.

2014-04-24 11:16 GMT+02:00 James Hunt <email address hidden>:

> Can you confirm that you are talking about PID 1? How are you checking
> the amount of memory init is using?
>
> Also, do you have a /var/log/upstart/ directory on your system?
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to the bug
> report.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1312051
>
> Title:
> Upstart init process consuming all ram
>
> To manage notifications about this bug go to:
>
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/upstart/+bug/1312051/+subscriptions
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[James Hunt (jamesodhunt)]

Hi Leonardo - no problem. Can you check to ensure you have a ~/.cache/upstart/ directory (or "$XDG_CACHE_HOME/upstart/" if you have manually set XDG_CACHE_HOME). Also, is the session init process consuming a lot of CPU ("top -b -n1")?

[Leonardo Corato (leocor)]

Thanks James.

Init is not using a lot of cpu (top -b -n1) :
2689 leo 20 0 351944 244552 2252 S 0,0 6,2 1:16.82 init

I confirm that there is a ~/.cache/upstart/ directory.

2014-04-24 12:53 GMT+02:00 James Hunt <email address hidden>:

> Hi Leonardo - no problem. Can you check to ensure you have a
> ~/.cache/upstart/ directory (or "$XDG_CACHE_HOME/upstart/" if you have
> manually set XDG_CACHE_HOME). Also, is the session init process
> consuming a lot of CPU ("top -b -n1")?
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to the bug
> report.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1312051
>
> Title:
> Upstart init process consuming all ram
>
> To manage notifications about this bug go to:
>
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/upstart/+bug/1312051/+subscriptions
>

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[kougioumtzis kostas (kougioumtzis)]

This has worked for me:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/upstart/+bug/1302955

[Leonardo Corato (leocor)]

SOLVED: I confirm Kostas solution. 'apt-get purge unity-greeter-session-broadcast' fixed it.

[PimmingerA (alfred-pimminger)]

Are there any new solutions?
I have the same problem with Ubuntu 14.04.
Every 10s the process "init --user" grows 0.1% of total storage.
So after one day the system ran out of memory and cracks up

[Looooop (looooop)]

I confirm this, after 16 days of uptime on ubuntu 14.10 desktop, the process upstart use 1,8 GB of memory.

lop@work:~$ ps aux | grep "upstart --user"
lop 7656 0.1 22.9 2218984 1851736 ? Ss apr07 9:14 upstart --user

Any workaround? i don't have any unity-greeter-session-broadcast installed

Regards

[ssolo (evgeny-l)]

10G memory in total, of wich 6.4G RAM and 3+G swap...
A bit too much. Ubuntu 15.10

[Rob Teszka (rob-teszka)]

I have been getting this bug repeatedly on 16.04 LTS. After about say 2 hours of uptime everything is extremely slow and unresponsive, even just editing text files. I have to log into a different console with ctrl+alt+f1 to do anything. According to top, upstart is using about 100% CPU and around 40% memory. It's intermittent, only happens about every 4-5 reboots or so, but boy is it annoying. Any suggestions? Any logs I can post to help diagnose?