Slow startup times

[sharlila]

I installed knoppix recently and I have a problem which I can't identify.
Some of the programs I open takes about 3 minutes to open and some
open right away. For example, konqueror opens in a heartbeat while
kwrite or kview takes forever (3 minutes). Also, opening superkaramba
takes a second, but when trying to open the file dialog to select a theme
you wait a long time. Sometimes even the "Start" menu makes you
wait several minutes.

When starting these programs through konsole showed no errors.


Someone has an idea about this issue?
thank you./

[sharlila]

wanted to ask in the same time if there's a way to initiate the network
on startup. till now I have to use networkconfig and then select
eth1, then answer yes for the DHCP question, and only then I get
network.

[kuser123]

strace kwrite
or try:
strace -e file kwrite
And look where the long delays are. Maybe that helps. If you are not familiar with the strace output then post it here. Maybe someone else can help you.

[sharlila]

thank you,
it pauses for a long time on trying to open "/etc/rpc".

here's the last several lines of the log, till it gets stuck

open("/usr/lib/i686/libnss_db.so.2", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
stat64("/usr/lib/i686", {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0755, st_size=4096, ...}) = 0
open("/usr/lib/mmx/cmov/libnss_db.so.2", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
stat64("/usr/lib/mmx/cmov", 0xbfffe9ec) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/usr/lib/mmx/libnss_db.so.2", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
stat64("/usr/lib/mmx", 0xbfffe9ec)      = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/usr/lib/cmov/libnss_db.so.2", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
stat64("/usr/lib/cmov", 0xbfffe9ec)     = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/usr/lib/libnss_db.so.2", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
stat64("/usr/lib", {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0755, st_size=40960, ...}) = 0
open("/etc/ld.so.cache", O_RDONLY)      = 11
fstat64(11, {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=59821, ...}) = 0
access("/etc/ld.so.nohwcap", F_OK)      = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/lib/tls/libnss_files.so.2", O_RDONLY) = 11
fstat64(11, {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=35288, ...}) = 0
open("/etc/rpc", O_RDONLY)              = 11
fstat64(11, {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=853, ...}) = 0

[kuser123]

Ok, /etc/rpc is for network services. As you asked in your second post you seem to have problems with your network setup. Why is your network eth1 and not eth0? Is there another network card installed? It seems so. When you type ifconfig as root or /sbin/ifconfig as user you will get all networks which are up at this time. I think eth0 is already configured (maybe onboard ethernet card) and eth1 (additional network card) is not configured by default.

PLEASE: Read first the whole text before you change anything in your system!!

1) How to change the numbering:
The numbering of ethX is given by the order the drivers are loaded (for different network card types) and by the PCI-bus numbering (for network cards of the same type).
So when you want to have eth1 as eth0 and vice versa you have to blacklist the network card drivers by inserting the driver names in /etc/hotplug/blacklist. Then you have to have to insert these driver names in /etc/modules in the order you want.

2) Setup eth1 on boot:
Because for you eth1 works well when configured, you shouldn't change things described in 1) because you may run into troubles if you are not familiar with those things!
To setup eth1 automatically on boot you just have to change /etc/network/interfaces in the following way:
OLD: auto lo eth0
NEW: auto lo eth0 eth1
NEW: iface eth1 inet dchp
Now eth1 should be configured automatically on startup. If this doesn't work you may have the problem that your driver isn't automatically loaded on startup (onyl god knows why not...) So then do the following:
configure your network card as you described in your second posting. Then type lsmod as root in a shell. The last loaded driver (TOP LINE in the driver list!) is the one for your network card. Add this name to /etc/modules and then it should work like lubricated

3) Where do the delays come from?
The answer is that on startup and also on a running system a lot of network services sometimes try to access the network. These accesses have big timeouts of several seconds which can block some programs when the accesses fail.

I hope this helps and make some things clearer.

Greetings, Martin

[sharlila]

thanks a lot for the reply, but I need to clarify something:
You think the slow application loading is caused by the network?
I think it's something else. I've noticed that it happens only to
KDE applications (kedit, kwrite, konqueror filebrowser, and when
trying to open the 'file open' dialog which have the kde default
dialog, sometimes when I press on the kde's 'start' menu).
To other X apps it does not happen, and also it does not
happen to every kde app.

About the network card, I'll try your (2) suggestion. thanks.

[kuser123]

KDE Apps extensively use KIO objects which can also do network communication. So when you write a KDE Apps you don't have to worry much about network programming. It may be that these KIO Objects block the KDE Apps for the timeout time for network accesses.
As I said: It may be...
Each start of a network access can have up to two states:
1) Do a DNS-Query to convert it into an IP-Address/Network
2) Connect to the desired device/Do network scanning, etc.

1) and 2) can block apps. So when network is not configured correctly apps can be blocked for a while. You can see this when debugging with strace, gdb, etc.

Cheers, Martin

[sharlila]

kuser123, I have a little question about the 'interface' file, this is mine:

auto lo eth1
iface lo inet loopback

auto eth0 eth1
iface eth0 inet dhcp


iface eth1 inet dhcp

it's not exactly how you wrote it should be, so I was wondering if any
lines are expendible. BTW, I think that eth0 might be my winmodem,
can it be? cause I don't have any other network cards in my computer.

[kuser123]

Your interfaces file looks good. But it is enough to have one "auto..." line. So you can simplify the file:
"auto lo eth0 eth1" The second "auto..." can be then deleted. But this is only for cosmetic...
I don't know much about WinModems but it can be that eth0 is a WinModem.
If eth1 is still not working by default on startup you may have the problem that your network card driver is not loaded on startup. So add the name of the needed driver module to /etc/modules

[sharlila]

sorry to bother you on such a "trivial" question but I can't seem to find
the network module

root@knopbox:~# lsmod
Module                  Size  Used by
snd_mixer_oss          19072  0
appletalk              37452  2
ax25                   68044  2
ipx                    32164  2
lp                     13768  0
ipt_state               6272  55
ipt_REJECT              9728  4
ipt_limit               6784  6
ipt_LOG                10496  6
ip_conntrack_ftp       75540  0
ip_conntrack           35588  2 ipt_state,ip_conntrack_ftp
iptable_filter          6784  1
ip_tables              20240  5 ipt_state,ipt_REJECT,ipt_limit,ipt_LOG,iptable_filter
pci_hotplug            33724  0
8250_pci               20352  0
snd_trident            43524  0
snd_ac97_codec         59268  1 snd_trident
snd_pcm                86144  1 snd_trident
snd_timer              25344  1 snd_pcm
snd_page_alloc         13060  2 snd_trident,snd_pcm
snd_util_mem            7680  1 snd_trident
snd_mpu401_uart        10496  1 snd_trident
snd_rawmidi            23552  1 snd_mpu401_uart
snd_seq_device         10756  2 snd_trident,snd_rawmidi
snd                    49540  9 snd_mixer_oss,snd_trident,snd_ac97_codec,snd_pcm,snd_timer,snd_util_mem,snd_mpu401_uart,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq_device
tsdev                   9984  0
evdev                  11520  0
dm_mod                 40608  0
raw1394                30828  0
ehci_hcd               29824  0
md5                     8064  1
ipv6                  248736  8
sis                    46432  2
via_agp                 9856  0
sworks_agp             11424  0
sis_agp                 9472  1
nvidia_agp             10012  0
intel_mch_agp          12044  0
intel_agp              18968  0
efficeon_agp           10496  0
ati_agp                10636  0
amd64_agp              12872  0
amd_k7_agp             10124  0
ali_agp                 9600  0
autofs                 19456  1
af_packet              21124  0
nls_iso8859_1           8320  1
nls_cp437               9984  1
agpgart                31564  12 via_agp,sworks_agp,sis_agp,nvidia_agp,intel_mch_agp,intel_agp,efficeon_agp,ati_agp,amd64_agp,amd_k7_agp,ali_agp
trident                39764  4
soundcore              12000  6 snd,trident
gameport                8192  2 snd_trident,trident
ac97_codec             19840  1 trident
sis900                 21124  0
crc32                   8448  1 sis900
parport_pc             38176  1
parport                38848  2 lp,parport_pc
8250                   34448  1 8250_pci
serial_core            22912  1 8250
eth1394                22788  0
ds                     17920  4
yenta_socket           20736  0
pcmcia_core            58240  2 ds,yenta_socket
thermal                14992  0
processor              20672  1 thermal
fan                     7564  0
button                  9496  0
battery                12428  0
ac                      8076  0
rtc                    15432  0
ohci1394               33792  0
ieee1394              305296  3 raw1394,eth1394,ohci1394
usb_storage            66816  1
ohci_hcd               20864  0
uhci_hcd               31112  0
usbcore                94420  6 ehci_hcd,usb_storage,ohci_hcd,uhci_hcd
ide_cd                 40576  0
ide_scsi               17540  1
ext3                  108648  1
jbd                    67488  1 ext3

which one is it?