User Guide

20 Server Memory Administration Guide
Server Memory Administration Guide
103-000147-001
August 30, 2001
Novell Confidential
Manual 99a38 July 17, 2001
Tuning Server Memory
NetWare is a self-tuning operating system; however, there are some things you
can do to adjust the server's memory subsystem (as well as other aspects of
server operation) to fine tune its performance.
Before attempting to tune a new server's memory, let the server operate at full
capacity for a week or two to allow NetWare to self-tune. After the server
settles in to a predictable pattern of daily use, you can begin to fine-tune the
server's memory as described in the following sections.
 “Tuning File Cache” on page 20
 “Tuning Directory Cache for the Traditional File System” on page 24
Tuning File Cache
File cache not only speeds access to file data, it is used to cache portions of the
Novell eDirectory
TM
database. If you want to tune your NetWare server in
general, or eDirectory in particular, tune the file cache.
Novell Storage Services File System
In NetWare 6, the Novell Storage Services
TM
(NSS) is loaded on the server by
default, but cache memory is not allocated to it unless it is actually running.
NSS uses memory differently that the traditional file system and you must use
specific parameters for tuning your server when using NSS.
To view statistics for cache buffers used by NSS, enter the following
command at the System Console prompt:
nss /cachestats
For heavy access on an NSS logical volume, the server might incur some
performance issues. NSS has its own caching and parameters to be set during
the loading of the NSS modules. The following are several SET parameters
that you can use to tune the performance of NSS:
 Cachebalance controls how much memory is available for NSS to use
for cache. The cachebalance percentage determines how many cache
blocks NSS will take from the traditional file system for its own cache. A
high cache balance percentage will impede the performance of the
traditional file system. A low cache balance will impede the preformance
of NSS. We recommend that you set the cache balance parmeter to equal
the percentage of the total disk space you allocate for NSS. The default is