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Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

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    #1

    Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

    Dear Alpha community.
    I recently set up a system at one of our clients and Alpha is constantly crashing and I can't find any reason why.


    The system is surveillance system running on LAN and is a part of larger system.
    The Alpha system is only the front for the operators, does some SQL to MSSQL and a lot requests to web server using "http_fetch"


    There are only 3-4 concurrent users connected at each time but there is a lot of ajax callbacks refreshing data on the pages.
    I have tested the system with 30+ users with lot of browser windows open and there are absolutely no problem.
    CPU just raise up to 6-15% under heavy load..


    The only pattern I see is that Alpha seems to be more likely to crash when there have been little activity and users are start using the system again. (early in the morning, middle of the night etc)
    When the system is in heavy use, everything seems to work fine..


    I have focused on the sessions and investigate all my code, I always check if session variables exist and redirect to login screen if needed ( eval_valid("session.user_name") ).
    And as I said before, in all my test there are no crashes. I have set the session timeout to just few minutes, left system on overnight and nothing fails when I test on my test server..


    So my questions are.
    Is this a bug?
    Is there someone who may know what could be crashing the server or at least where I should be looking for bugs?


    System and version :
    Alpha : 3922_4757 (OCT-26-2016) (Upgraded from 3670_4684 and that did not fix the problem)
    MSSQL 2014


    The server is new and is dedicated for this project (running Alpha, MSSQL, Surveillance /web service)
    Windows 7 Professional service pack 1 (all updates)
    CPU : Intel Xeon E3-1225V3 Quad 3.2GHz
    RAM : 16GB
    Disk : 240GB 2.5" SSD


    Any help would be highly appreciated
    Tags: None
    #2
    Re: Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

    I know for a fact that a bad video card or video ram can cause program crashes, and not just Alpha. So for instance, a screen saver kicks in and starts eating video ram or causing overheating of the card - as soon as someone starts using the PC it crashes. When you say "It crashes" what is the actual scenario? Does a window come up and say somethign to the effect that Alpha has crashed and an event was logged or does the whole PC freeze? If you have microsoft office open at the same time does it crash too or is it just Alpha.
    Things like this can be Alpha related or PC related - figuring that out is the trick and in this case I think it will be difficult to trouble shoot. Personally I think it is related to the PC the application is served from since you cannot duplicate the issue on your own PC.
    NWCOPRO: Nuisance Wildlife Control Software My Application: http://www.nwcopro.com "Without forgetting, we would have no memory at all...now what was I saying?"

    Comment

      #3
      Re: Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

      Hi Charles and thank for the response.
      There is nothing else running on the server, browser are on other machines.
      Alpha is the only program who crashes and needs to restart. The Surveillance /web service running on the server is also programmed by me and it is doing lot more work than the Alfa server, and it never crash, nor MSSQL.

      The user usually get message in the browser that site can not be reach.
      On the server, sometimes Alpha is gone, sometimes Alpha using maximum CPU and I need to kill the process. Once there was a messageDlg on screen, “Alpha5 Unrecoverable Error : Unhandled Exception, the thread tried to read from or write to a virtual address for which it does not have appropriate access.”

      Comment

        #4
        Re: Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

        Please test the latest release. There was a change made after build 3922 to capture a very specific (and rare) error condition that could cause a crash.

        Comment

          #5
          Re: Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

          Hi Jerry and thank you for the response.
          I don't have subscription after 3922 and I am not sure we upgrade now only to test if it works….
          Is there a workaround for this “ very specific (and rare) error condition” ?
          What is the last stable version before this bug?
          Best regards.

          Comment

            #6
            Re: Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

            There is no workaround, and the specific problem should not have existed in build 3670. if you had the same issues in 3670, that would suggest this condition was not the cause of the problem

            Comment

              #7
              Re: Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

              I would definitely start checking the error logs on the server, if I had to guess there's something of a truth in the "the thread tried to read from or write to a virtual address" area. The server might have a policy that is logging off OR shutting down resources, in other words I think it is the environment and would look into those logs both in the windows server and to turn on error logging in the alpha server to see what doing there.
              I am not an expert in either area - but I have fixed some issues in the past by following this method.
              NWCOPRO: Nuisance Wildlife Control Software My Application: http://www.nwcopro.com "Without forgetting, we would have no memory at all...now what was I saying?"

              Comment

                #8
                Re: Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

                Alpha crashed again this morning. As usual they are coming from a quiet night shift and starting the day.
                System logs and after discussing with users shows nothing out of the ordinary.

                I attach the logs if it tells any of you anything..

                System log, last hour before the crash :
                Time IP Address Action User
                -------------------------------------------------------------------------
                06:34:32 xxx.5.64.175 login/landing page Admin
                06:35:22 xxx.5.64.175 Utilization report Admin
                06:35:38 xxx.5.64.175 Inventory report Admin
                07:04:42 xxx.5.64.128 Open virtual tank 3 (43325) AOT
                07:24:23 xxx.5.64.100 Open virtual tank 27 (43283) AOT
                07:40:11 xxx.5.64.100 Open virtual tank 3 (43325) AOT - User never got response
                07:40:55 : Alpha crash (ErrorStacklog file timestamp)

                See attachment for Windows event log and Alpha ErrorStacklog.
                Attached Files

                Comment

                  #9
                  Re: Alpha crash (after being idle for some time?)

                  I don't know why your server is crashing, but I know you can get a 1 year subscription to Alpha for under $1000 (depending upon your version.)

                  Even if it doesn't immediately fix your problem (which it might do), you would get better support.

                  Barring that:

                  Are you running Alpha independently or is it running in Always UP?

                  If in Always up, you could setup parameters to restart it under certain conditions. since your sessions are only a few minutes anyway, this might be a good option.

                  If you are NOT in Always up, you might download a copy and try it.

                  You might also try running it without Always up to see if it crashes the same when run by itself.

                  BTW: Is the crash always around the same time(s)? Are there other processes that run when the system is idle that could be giving Alpha fits? Maybe a virus scan?

                  Comment

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