Apache OpenOffice (AOO) Bugzilla – Issue 95411
Multiple Instance Open Office Crash...
Last modified: 2009-06-22 12:42:32 UTC
I have installed two instances of Open Office 3.0.0 on Linux machine. The instances get killed after sometime. (This was not happening when i was running a single instance of Open Office earlier). Installation Steps for the second instance were as metioned in SETUP_GUIDE.pdf (page 46/47), the steps are: Linux 1. Open a new shell or terminal. 2. Change to the directory where all the rpm packages are. (e.g.. /tmp/openoffice/rpm) 3. Choose the location where to install the extra version of Openoffice.org. For example into the directory /home/user1/office 4. Install the new version in a manner similar to the following: 5. rpm -ivh --install --dbpath /home/user1/office/.rpm --nodeps -- prefix /home/user1/office/ openoffice*.rpm Note: When you install the office in this way you have no system integration (no start menu entries and no file association) 6. After installation has completed, change to the new directory and do the following: Open the file bootstrap.ini in a editor such as vi and change the line UserInstallation=$SYSUSERCONFIG/.openoffice.org2 to UserInstallation=$SYSUSERCONFIG/.openoffice.org2_dutch or any other directory you want. 7. Once installation is complete, Start this new installation of OpenOffice.org from the directory where it was installed. e.g. /home/user1/office/program/soffice One point to note above is that there is no bootstrap.ini, instead there is a bootstraprpc file. There too is is not clear what should be mentioned in UserInstallation=<value> here; nevertheless i mentioned something. I am able to start both instances together without any problems, even able to use them (by connecting to them from my java program to convert docs). But after sometime (maybe 30 mins, but it varies), one or both instances get killed. I did a strace on the soffice(second instance) by using this command: strace -t -o strace.out /opt/openoffice.org3/program/soffice -headless - accept="socket,host=n.n.n.n,port=8100;urp;" -nofirststartwizard & A part of this strace is pasted below: 1. 05:57:53 rt_sigprocmask(SIG_BLOCK, [CHLD], [], 8) = 0 2. 05:57:53 rt_sigaction(SIGINT, {0x8075dc0, [], SA_RESTORER, 0x420277b8}, {SIG_DFL}, 8) = 0 3. 05:57:53 wait4(-1, [WIFSIGNALED(s) && WTERMSIG(s) == SIGKILL], 0, NULL) = 23905 4. 06:19:00 open("/usr/share/locale/locale.alias", O_RDONLY) = 3 5. 06:19:00 fstat64(3, {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=2601, ...}) = 0 6. 06:19:00 mmap2(NULL, 4096, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_ANONYMOUS, - 1, 0) = 0x4001c000 If you see line 3. above, it appears that there was a SIGKILL for process 23905, which was the soffice process. Infact both the soffice instances (one was started on port 8100, and other on 9100), got killed together. The linux version is follows: #uname -r 2.4.20-8smp
Created attachment 57434 [details] Strace Output for the Open Office process
It's a little bit confusing. You are using OOo 3? What bootstraprc are you changing? 'UserInstallation=$SYSUSERCONFIG/.openoffice.org2' is about OOo 2.x. Did you ghet the crash too when you don't use the headless mode?
Actually i copied(and followed) the install instructions from Open Office 2x Setup Guide, which is available here: http://documentation.openoffice.org/setup_guide2/2.x/en/SETUP_GUIDE.pdf (pls see page 46/47 here). Cannot find equivalent multi-instance install instructions for Open Office 3x. So, I've assumed that setup instructions are valid for 3x too. I am indeed using Open Office 3.0 Also i am using the headless mode always, and start Open Office by using the following command: # /opt/openoffice.org3/program/soffice -headless - accept="socket,host=<myIPHere>,port=8100;urp;" -nofirststartwizard & I connect to it from my java program do doc conversions.
Did you get the crash when you don't use the headless mode? BTW: OOo 3 uses "UserInstallation=$SYSUSERCONFIG/.openoffice.org/3" as default for the user folders. What Linux do you use?
The problem was resolved - by rebooting the machine :) - discovered accidently ofcourse. It appears that after installing the second instance of OO on a machine, both instances become unstable (saw this behavior on many machines). The hardware must be rebooted once (after installing the second instance) - to resolve the issue. (Requesting this forum administrator to change the bug status to an appropriate one - maybe Open office folks can confirm this behavior, and add it to release notes or do a fix - if they can replicate it too)
Having two instances of OOo installed is not a common use case.
closing
Just to cite a reason why multiple instances of Open Office become necessary - Open Office does not handle multiple documents processing well(this has been documented in many discussion threads too) - infact OO crashes when mutiple documents are processed simultaneously. Therefore, if one wants to process (say convert from one format to another etc.) multiple files simultaneously (in headless mode), you need mulitple instances of Open office to work with.
@ sg: Do you have any information about "OO crashes when mutiple documents are processed simultaneously"?
Sorry to jump in... you may want to take a look at this thread of discussion about OOs multi-thread issues (this remains a unresolved problem): http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml? t=2913&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0
reopened for further investigation.
reassigned
As a general idea: you can start one OpenOffice.org installation several times with different user installations. Every started user instance is usable for whatever purpose you decide, so there's really no need to install the same Office multiple times. The multi-thread issue does not apply then. When you say, one or both get killed after some time, you cannot reproduce the crash with only one started Office? And what exactly do you let the Offices do when the crash happens? Could it be one of the documents? I do not really think that both installations communicate with each other, and I cannot reproduce the behavior with a simple setting.
Didn't quite understand: "you can start one OpenOffice.org installation several times with different user installations" Pls note, there are two issues here. Unrelated to each other. (A) Multiple Open Office were installed as per Open Office documentation available here: http://documentation.openoffice.org/setup_guide2/2.x/en/SETUP_GUIDE.pdf Pls see: see page 46/47. As stated earlier, the multiple open office installs "works fine" - after rebooting the hardware. So this is not an issue anymore. The need for multiple instances arose because of the problem cited in (B) below. (B) A single Open Office instance cannot process multiple documents simultaneously. Discussed in much detail in this discussion thread: http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml? t=2913&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0 This problem can be reproduced by using a program like java to connect to open office and try to convert docs from one format to another. If many docs are attempted to be converted simultaneously, OO crashes. I am able to reproduce this problem fairly consistently.
OK, I did indeed not understand correctly. But regarding (B): if you create user installations and ports for attaching, you do not need to install the same office multiple times: start <your_office>/soffice -env:UserInstallation=file://<file_url1> -accept=<socket1> and <your_office>/soffice -env:UserInstallation=file://<file_url2> -accept=<socket2> then you have two user installations that can be connected. You should not try to use one connection with several processes, agreed. But this will work fine with only one installed office.
sg, Not sure if you are suggesting anything different from what is suggested here about how to install and run multiple OO instances: (which is what i used): http://documentation.openoffice.org/setup_guide2/2.x/en/SETUP_GUIDE.pdf Pls see: see page 46/47. And i start individual Open Office instance as follows: Start first OO instance: /opt/openoffice.org3/program/soffice -headless - accept="socket,host=locahost,port=8100;urp;" -nofirststartwizard & Start second OO instance: /opt/Openoffice-1/openoffice.org3/program/soffice -headless - accept="socket,host=localhost,port=9100;urp;" -nofirststartwizard &
I am fairly sure that I suggested somethig very different from your approach: my point was that you do not have to install two individual OpenOffice.org installations. Throw away /opt/Openoffice-1 and use two user instances instead of OOo installations. Execute this for the first connectable OOo instance: /opt/openoffice.org3/program/soffice -env:UserInstallation=file:///var/tmp/user1 -headless -accept="socket,host=locahost,port=8100;urp;" -nofirststartwizard & Execute this for the second connectable OOo instance: /opt/openoffice.org3/program/soffice -env:UserInstallation=file:///var/tmp/user2 -headless -accept="socket,host=localhost,port=9100;urp;" -nofirststartwizard & Now you use only one OOo installation.
orginal bug is not reproducible.
.
closing issue.