TM1 9.4 FP2 - Web Garden Process issue

[Ernest]

Environment:
We're a new install of TM1, using 64 Bit TM1 9.4 FP2 on one 8 CPU server with a second 4 CPU 32 Bit Windows 2003 SP2 server functioning as the Web Server.

Question/Issue:
On the Web server, in IIS 6.0, we've set an application pool for the TM1Web web site, and whenever we try and set the "maximum number of processes" to greater than 1 to achieve "potential" performance gains from having an IIS web garden, the users can't log in or have to log in multiple times in rapid succession or and have to re-login frequently....its unusable with more than one process.

Can more than one worker process ever be used?

IBM support has not provided guidance on this yet and I'm wondering if they know about the web garden feature or not for TM1.

The reason for us pushing on this is that our infrastructure folks want to maximize performance, and seeing a single w3wp.exe process on the 4 CPU web server makes them unhappy. We've seen the w3wp.exe process generally running at 500-600 MB on a 4GB box.

Also, we did a small stress test recently, and did not see the memory leakage that another post experienced:
http://forums.olapforums.com/viewtopic. ... .exe#p5639

Environment:

Microsoft Server 2003 Standard x64 Edition SP2 for TM1 9.4 FP2

Microsoft Server 2003 Standard Edition SP2 for TM1Web


Info from MS for those interested:

In IIS 6.0 worker process isolation mode, application pools enhance Web site or application reliability by isolating applications and the worker processes that service those applications. For even greater reliability, you can configure an application pool to be supported by multiple worker processes. An application pool that uses more than one worker process is called a Web garden. The worker processes in a Web garden share the requests that arrive for that particular application pool. If a worker process fails, another worker process can continue to process requests.

[mattgoff]

Easy answer on this one, but not the one you want to hear: Web Gardens are not supported. I looked into this a while back (9.0.2) and got an official "no" from support. I haven't seen anything in the docs to show that it's changed.

Matt

[Ernest]

Thanks.

I still have an SR with IBM on it. If they do come back with anything I'll post it.

[Martin Erlmoser]

also heard "not supported"

[Ernest]

Per IBM Support, more than 1 worker process for a web garden application pool is still not available.

We'll be submitting an enhancement request, though I'm not sure if it will add much performance to TM1Web, as it sounds like its more for reliability.

[lotsaram]

It is possible to get better utilisation from your hardware but only if you go to the trouble of setting up separate websites and app pools (and then load share by whatever suitable method.)

Not that simple and not what you want to hear but possible...