System configuration overview¶

# cat /etc/sysctl.conf
...
net.core.somaxconn = 4096
net.ipv4.tcp_max_syn_backlog = 2048
...
# ulimit -nH 4096

Make sure that your /tmp is in ramdisk which improves session handling performance. To do so, add the following to /etc/fstab:

none /tmp tmpfs,size=6g defaults

Caching¶

Caching improves performance by storing data, code, and other objects in memory.

The APC or OPCache bytecode cache are commonly used in PHP environments. This example installs APC on CentOS/Red Hat/Fedora systems running PHP 5.4:

$ sudo yum install php-pecl-apc

On Ubuntu systems running PHP 5.4 this command installs APC:

$ sudo apt-get install php-apc

PHP 5.5 replaces APC with OPCache. OPCache is bundled with PHP 5.5 so it should not be necessary to install it separately. OPCache improves PHP performance by storing precompiled script bytecode in shared memory, thereby removing the need for PHP to load and parse scripts on each request. This extension is bundled with PHP 5.5.0 and later, and is available in PECL for PHP versions 5.2, 5.3, and 5.4.

APC is both an opcode cache and data store. OPCache is only an opcode cache, so for caching user data you should also install APCu.

The Redis key-value cache and store is an excellent fast and robust cache. For configuration examples see Config.php Parameters.

Distributed PHP environments should use Memcached. Memcached servers must be specified in the memcached_servers array in ownCloud’s config file config.php. For examples see Config.php Parameters.

Note

When a memory cache has been configured, but is unavailable due to a a missing extension or server downtime, ownCloud will be inaccessible, as a memory cache is considered to be a vital component.

Tuning System Parameters¶

Configuration for more concurrent requests.

echo "2048 64512" > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_local_port_range
echo "1" > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_tw_recycle
echo "1" > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_tw_reuse
echo "10" > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_fin_timeout

echo "65535" > /proc/sys/net/core/somaxconn
echo "65535" > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_max_syn_backlog
echo "262144" > /proc/sys/net/netfilter/nf_conntrack_max

Check if the values have been set accordingly:

# cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_local_port_range
2048 64512
# cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_tw_recycle
1
# cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_tw_reuse
1
# cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_fin_timeout
10
# cat /proc/sys/net/core/somaxconn
65535
# cat /proc/sys/net/ipv4/tcp_max_syn_backlog
65535
# cat /proc/sys/net/netfilter/nf_conntrack_max
262144

Next, persist the settings across reboots by adding them into /etc/sysctl.conf:

net.ipv4.ip_local_port_range = 2048 64512
net.ipv4.tcp_tw_recycle = 1
net.ipv4.tcp_tw_reuse = 1
net.ipv4.tcp_fin_timeout = 10

net.core.somaxconn = 65535
net.ipv4.tcp_max_syn_backlog = 65535
net.netfilter.nf_conntrack_max = 262144

Tuning Memory¶

Add RAM disk to fstab:

- none /var/www/html tmpfs defaults,size=6g

Move PHP Code into RAM Disk:

# mv /var/www/html /var/www/html_fs

Copy ownCloud installation to RAM Disk and symlink storage to ownCloud data directory.

Serving static files via web server¶

See the section Serving Static Files for Better Performance for a description and the benefits.

Using cron to perform background jobs¶

See the section Defining Background Jobs for a description and the benefits.

Enable JavaScript and CSS Asset Management¶

See the section JavaScript and CSS Asset Management for a description and the benefits.

SSL session reuse¶

You should enable SSL session tickets or SSL session identifiers in your web server. This will lead to lower delay in connection setup time for TCP connections to the ownCloud.

Enable the SPDY protocol¶

Your webserver can be configured to use the SPDY protocol which could improve the overall performance of ownCloud. Please have a look at the documentation of your webservers module for more information:

• mod-spdy for Apache
• ngx_http_spdy_module for nginx

Maximum number Apache processes¶

An Apache process is using around 12MB of RAM. Apache should be configured that the maximum number of HTTPD processes time 12MB is lower than the amount of RAM. Otherwise the system begins to swap and the performance goes down. In this case the maximum number is set to 6000.

KeepAlive should be configured with sensible defaults¶

KeepAlive On
KeepAliveTimeout 2
MaxKeepAliveRequests 10

mod_gzip¶

mod_gzip should be used because it speeds up the transfer of data and helps to free server memory, and HTTP connections are closed faster.

PHP safe mode¶

PHP safe mode has to be turned off. It is deprecated and will be removed in newer PHP versions.

MPM¶

Apache prefork has to be used. Don’t use threaded mpm with mod_php because PHP is currently not thread safe.

Hostname Lookups¶

# cat /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf
...
HostnameLookups off

Log files¶

Log files should be switched off for maximum performance.

Comment out the CustomLog directive. Keep ErrorLog to be able to track down errors.

MaxKeepAliveRequests 4096¶

<IfModule prefork.c>
        StartServers 100
        MinSpareServers 100
        MaxSpareServers 2000
        ServerLimit 6000
        MaxClients 6000
        MaxRequestsPerChild 4000
</IfModule>

<Directory "/var/www/html">
        Options Indexes SymLinksIfOwnerMatch AllowOverride All
</Directory>

Using MariaDB/MySQL instead of SQLite¶

MySQL or MariaDB are preferred because of the performance limitations of SQLite with highly concurrent applications, like ownCloud.

On large instances you could consider running MySQLTuner to optimize the database.

See the section Database Configuration how to configure ownCloud for MySQL or MariaDB. If your installation is already running on SQLite then it is possible to convert to MySQL or MariaDB using the steps provided in Converting Database Type.

Improve slow performance with MySQL on Windows¶

On Windows hosts running MySQL on the same system changing the parameter dbhost in your config/config.php from localhost to 127.0.0.1 could improve the page loading time.

See also this forum thread.

Other performance improvements¶

Mysql: compare https://tools.percona.com/wizard to your current settings MariaDB: https://mariadb.com/kb/en/optimization-and-tuning/

Postgresql¶

Alternative to MariaDB/MySQL. Used in production by a few core developers.

Requires at least Postgresql 9.0

Oracle Database¶

Usage scenario: Existing enterprise installations. Only core apps are supported and tested. Not recommended because it involves compiling the oci8

Nginx module check¶

As a first step, it is necessary to check if your Nginx installation has the nginx cache purge module compiled in:

nginx -V 2>&1 | grep ngx_cache_purge -o

If your output contains ngx_cache_purge, you can continue with the configuration, else you need to manually compile Nginx with the module needed.

Compile Nginx with the nginx-cache-purge module¶

1. Preparation:

cd /opt
wget http://nginx.org/keys/nginx_signing.key
sudo apt-key add nginx_signing.key
sudo vi /etc/apt/sources.list.d/nginx.list

Add following lines (in case, replace {trusty} by your distribution name):

deb http://nginx.org/packages/mainline/ubuntu/ trusty nginx
deb -src http://nginx.org/packages/mainline/ubuntu/ trusty nginx

Then run sudo apt-get update

2. Download the Nginx source from the ppa repository

cd /opt
sudo apt-get build-dep nginx
sudo apt-get source nginx

3. Download module(s) to be compiled in and configure compiler arguments

ls -la

Please replace {release} with the release downloaded:

cd /opt/nginx-{release}/debian

If folder “modules” is not present, do:

sudo mkdir modules
cd modules
sudo git clone https://github.com/FRiCKLE/ngx_cache_purge.git
sudo vi /opt/nginx-{release}/debian/rules

If not present, add the following line at the top under:

#export DH_VERBOSE=1:
MODULESDIR = $(CURDIR)/debian/modules

And the end of every configure command add:

--add-module=$(MODULESDIR)/ngx_cache_purge

Don’t forget to escape preceeding lines with a backslash \. The parameters may now look:

$(WITH_SPDY) \
--with-cc-opt="$(CFLAGS)" \
--with-ld-opt="$(LDFLAGS)" \
--with-ipv6 \
--add-module=$(MODULESDIR)/ngx_cache_purge

4. Compile and install Nginx

cd /opt/nginx-{release}
sudo dpkg-buildpackage -uc -b
ls -la /opt
sudo dpkg --install /opt/nginx_{release}~{distribution}_amd64.deb

5. Check if the compilation and installation of the ngx_cache_purge module was successful

nginx -V 2>&1 | grep ngx_cache_purge -o

It should show now: ngx_cache_purge

Show Nginx version including all features compiled and installed:

nginx -V 2>&1 | sed s/" --"/"\n\t--"/g

6. Mark Nginx to be blocked from further updates via apt-get

sudo dpkg --get-selections | grep nginx

For every nginx component listed run sudo apt-mark hold <component>

7. Regular checks for nginx updates

Do a regular visit on the Nginx news page and proceed in case of updates with item 2 to 5.

Configure Nginx with the nginx-cache-purge module¶

1. Preparation Create a directory where Nginx will save the cached thumbnails. Use any path that fits to your environment. Replace {path} in this example with your file path:

sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/tmp/cache

2. Configuration

sudo vi /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/{your-ownCloud-nginx-config-file}

Add at the beginning, but outside the server{} block:

fastcgi_cache_path {path} levels=1:2 keys_zone=OWNCLOUD:100m inactive=60m;

Add inside the server{} block, as an example of a configuration:

set $skip_cache 1;

# POST requests and urls with a query string should always go to PHP

if ($request_uri ~* "thumbnail.php")
{ set $skip_cache 0;
}

fastcgi_cache_key "$scheme$request_method$host$request_uri";
fastcgi_cache_use_stale error timeout invalid_header http_500;
fastcgi_ignore_headers Cache-Control Expires Set-Cookie;

location ~ \.php(?:$/) {
      fastcgi_split_path_info ^(.+\.php)(/.+)$;

      include fastcgi_params;
      fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $document_root$fastcgi_script_name;
      fastcgi_param PATH_INFO $fastcgi_path_info;
      fastcgi_param HTTPS on;
      fastcgi_pass php-handler;

      fastcgi_cache_bypass $skip_cache;
      fastcgi_no_cache $skip_cache;
      fastcgi_cache OWNCLOUD;
      fastcgi_cache_valid  60m;
      }

3. Test the configuration

sudo service nginx restart

• Open your browser and clear your cache.
• Logon to your ownCloud instance, open the gallery app, move thru your folders and watch while the thumbnails are generated for the first time.
• You may also watch with eg. htop your system load while the thumbnails are processed.
• Go to another app or logout and relogon.
• Open the gallery app again and browse to the folders you accessed before. Your thumbnails should appear more or less immediately.
• htop will not show up additional load while processing, compared to the high load before.