InDesignServer - Find and remove unresponsive InDesignServer instances

Prerequisite

RenderClient using the auto start feature (of InDesign Server)to operate InDesignServers

Unresponsive InDesignServer instances

In general this means the instance is unresponsive over a longer time.
(e.g. Another RMI service call is currently active Errors)

Important hints to recognize the situation

• The renderer seems to be slow, even if all instances are shown as available

• The renderer hardware has a durable high memory consumption

• The renderer hardware has a durable high CPU load

Procedure to find and restart unresponsive instances

1. Find all instances on a Windows machine

• Open the 'Windows Task Manager / Processes'

• Sort by 'Image Path Name (DE: Abbildpfadname)'

• If this is not yet active you can active it in the task manager menu "View / Select Columns (DE: Ansicht / Spalten Auswählen)"

• Search for InDesignServer.exe. Check these InDesign Server instances for suspicious tasks as described further below.

2. Find all instances on a Mac

• Open the 'Mac Activity Monitor'.

• Search for 'indesigns' to display only InDesignServer tasks and sort by PID

• Check these InDesign Server instances for suspicious tasks as described below:

3. Identify a InDesignServer instance as 'suspicious',

• if the memory consumption keeps a permanent high level
  (e.g. CS4 > 350MB, CS5+5.5 > 650MB, CS6+higher > 950MB)
  and the active CPU time is more than 1:30 hours.

• if no job is active on the RenderClient but the memory usage or CPU time of an instance still rises constantly.

• if jobs are active but the same instance never changes its memory usage or CPU time.

• if (on mac) the application shows 'not Responding' in Activity Monitor,
  but this maybe a normal state of operation. So do not kill it too early!
  Please consider:
  Huge layouts with big storage items may need a long time to be calculated.
  e.g. A 4GB layout (including placed elements) will take about 25 minutes on a mac pro (2014).
  During this time the instance maybe unresponsive/'not Responding', but still working (See Image 1 below).

Image 1: OS X Activity Monitor

Image 2: Windows: Task manager

4. Restarting unresponsive InDesignServer

To kill the unresponsive InDesignServer select it in Windows Taskmanager or Mac Activity Monitor and 'quit' or 'force quit' the task.
As this may leave temporary files on your HDD you should monitor your used/free HDD space.

The killed instance will be restarted by the RenderClient automatically.

Hints on restarting RenderClient

If you close your RenderClient always check in windows Taskmanager or mac Activity Monitor if:

• the RenderClient really is closed

• all attached InDesignServer instances are closed

If not kill these manually before restarting your RenderClient.