handle reaching inotify max watches better

In a default ubuntu install i get:

$ sudo sysctl fs.inotify.max_user_watches
fs.inotify.max_user_watches = 524288

Which is enough for syncdaemon to work.

It is true that we could do something better than just fail when the user runs out of watches, so i am marking this as whishlist.

I get 8192 on Lucid 32-bit, Maverick 32-bit, Maverick 64-bit and Natty 32-bit.

Possibly the value is dependent on some resource of which you have more?

Let me also not that ever since my testing and the tripped value, I have removed that directory from my Ubuntu One folder in the hope that syncing would resume normally, but it didn't.

So there is the potential that tripping this value can put Ubuntu One in a state that doesn't allow it to sync correctly anymore.

David,
You can increase that number of watches with the following.

Open /etc/sysctl.conf for editing:
gksudo gedit /etc/sysctl.conf

Add this line to the bottom of the file (If the line exists just change the number):
 fs.inotify.max_user_watches = 524288

thank you,
duanedesign

duanedesign, thanks for the hint. For testing purposes I have updated the value and rebooted my system.

Before I had backed up my files, de-registered from my account, wiped Ubuntu one from the system incl. all local ubuntuone related files I could identify, reinstalled ubuntu one, re-registered, waited for the sync from the server to complete.

I then tried to restore the files from the backup into my Ubuntu One directory. The corresponding Sync is taking quite some time but I'll let it run for a few hours.

Hi guys just to let you know
I've experienced problems with running "less" command because of inotify limit which was
8192 on my machine
It was hard to diagnose as a message I got from "less" was very misleading
like
tail: cannot watch `catalina.out': No space left on device
there was plenty of space and the real reason was inotify watchers had been eaten by ubuntuone ;-)
This can affect many users and a lot of others applications
i so dropbox is displaying a message to the user when inotify limit is reached
I think you should do the same to let the users know what is going on
to avoid unnecessary frustration and save their time

Thanks for making ubuntuone
Szymon

Same thing here on raring.

shankao@maldita:~/www/aftertime$ sudo sysctl fs.inotify.max_user_watches
fs.inotify.max_user_watches = 8192

And it affects other programs of the system (i.e. tail reverts to polling).

I suggest to either increase the value automatically when installing ubuntuone to accomodate its requirements, decrease these requirements or, at least, notify the users somehow of the situation and the workarounds that they can try.

I suggest to raise the importance of this bug regardless of how simple the workaround would be, as it affects other main components in Ubuntu that rely on inotify not exhausted. For example:

- The already commented example of tail (on comment #6).
- Nautilus stops updating the folders state automatically and needs to be done manually (F5)

As the original reporter, I'd also suggest to inform the user about hitting this limit with a pointer to the workaround. I'm syncing about 40K+ files with Ubuntu One (10K+ directories) and if I forget to set this value on one of those machines, U1 of course "silently" does not sync those files that didn't get a watcher. (I say silently since it does report the issue in it's log file, but unless you are looking you will most certainly miss it).

I am raising the priority as this seems like something that affects a number of people.