Oracle Linux: A System Experienced Extremely High Load Causing Performance Issues And Hangs With Multiple Processes Stuck In D State While Performing "do_fork" (Doc ID 2594708.1)

Last updated on AUGUST 04, 2023

Applies to:

Symptoms

An Oracle Linux 6 server experienced load increasing to an extremely high level causing performance issues and hangs on the server.

Top output captured from the server showed the load massively increase over the space of several hours:

top - 11:59:45 up 91 days, 13:43, 0 users, load average: 149.63, 75.94, 37.42
Tasks: 14295 total, 168 running, 14126 sleeping, 0 stopped, 1 zombie
top - 12:00:14 up 91 days, 13:43, 0 users, load average: 162.35, 85.99, 41.98
Tasks: 14314 total, 202 running, 14111 sleeping, 0 stopped, 1 zombie
top - 12:00:47 up 91 days, 13:44, 0 users, load average: 180.46, 98.95, 47.94
Tasks: 14318 total, 202 running, 14116 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
top - 12:01:25 up 91 days, 13:44, 0 users, load average: 200.40, 114.04, 55.16
Tasks: 14443 total, 234 running, 14209 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
top - 13:25:39 up 91 days, 15:08, 6 users, load average: 2262.38, 2177.35, 1937.20
Tasks: 16797 total, 2228 running, 14569 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
top - 13:37:53 up 91 days, 15:21, 5 users, load average: 2527.11, 2442.43, 2208.48
Tasks: 17140 total, 2492 running, 14647 sleeping, 0 stopped, 1 zombie
top - 13:52:10 up 91 days, 15:35, 5 users, load average: 2840.55, 2756.60, 2525.34
Tasks: 17482 total, 2792 running, 14689 sleeping, 0 stopped, 1 zombie
top - 14:09:28 up 91 days, 15:52, 3 users, load average: 3219.82, 3135.93, 2906.30
Tasks: 17878 total, 3161 running, 14716 sleeping, 0 stopped, 1 zombie
top - 14:28:33 up 91 days, 16:11, 3 users, load average: 3662.50, 3574.75, 3334.30
Tasks: 18325 total, 3635 running, 14690 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
top - 14:52:42 up 91 days, 16:35, 5 users, load average: 4230.92, 4140.92, 3896.79
Tasks: 19134 total, 4209 running, 14925 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
top - 15:25:36 up 91 days, 17:08, 3 users, load average: 5024.46, 4924.33, 4672.10
Tasks: 19280 total, 4604 running, 14676 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
top - 16:03:48 up 91 days, 17:47, 1 user, load average: 5893.11, 5801.75, 5557.40
Tasks: 20006 total, 5180 running, 14826 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
top - 16:56:01 up 91 days, 18:39, 1 user, load average: 6966.77, 6894.84, 6676.36
Tasks: 21287 total, 6284 running, 15002 sleeping, 0 stopped, 1 zombie
top - 18:11:10 up 91 days, 19:54, 2 users, load average: 8502.29, 8418.90, 8206.34
Tasks: 23125 total, 7851 running, 15274 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
top - 19:58:41 up 91 days, 21:41, 3 users, load average: 10359.30, 10294.54, 10113.02
Tasks: 27268 total, 10116 running, 15862 sleeping, 0 stopped, 1289 zombie

Cause

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