# Mender and ulimit (number of open files) on raspbian
**URL:** https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453
**Category:** General Discussions
**Created:** [January 7, 2022, 4:03pm UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453 "2022-01-07T16:03:22Z")
**Posts on this page:** 9
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Jerry](https://hub.mender.io/u/Jerry)
#### Post date: [January 7, 2022, 4:03pm UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453/1 "2022-01-07T16:03:22Z")
We just got some of our devices that throw “too many open files” errors.
When we display which process consumes open files, mender and mender connect use a lot
```auto
root@mapado-box-dee46275:/home/dummy# lsof | awk '{print $1}' | sort | uniq -c | sort -r -n | head
731 mender
585 mender-co
285 python
180 colord
102 systemd-t
99 systemd
72 wpa_suppl
66 systemd-j
60 rngd
59 cupsd
```
We are on raspbian an ulimit (soft limit) is set to 1024.
Is there something wrong with our installation or mender do use a lot of open files.
Thanks for your help
---
### Author:  [@kacf](https://hub.mender.io/u/kacf)
#### Post date: [January 10, 2022, 6:22am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453/2 "2022-01-10T06:22:01Z")
I took a look at this and immediately noticed one file descriptor which is not closed, which I’ve fixed [here](https://github.com/mendersoftware/mender/pull/916). Perhaps you could give this a try?
It doesn’t necessarily fix your problem though, since the garbage collector should have cleaned this up eventually anyway. So there may be a deeper problem. If you’re still seeing the problem after attempting that patch (or if applying it is tricky), could you run this command on the device after some file descriptors have accumulated, and post the result?
```bash
ls -l /proc/$(pgrep '^mender$')/fd
```
---
### Author:  [@Jerry](https://hub.mender.io/u/Jerry)
#### Post date: [January 10, 2022, 8:23am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453/3 "2022-01-10T08:23:09Z")
Does this helps you ?
```auto
ls -l /proc/$(pgrep '^mender$')/fd
total 0
lr-x------ 1 root root 64 Jan 2 16:55 0 -> /dev/null
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 2 16:55 1 -> 'socket:[16932]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 10 -> 'socket:[6958168]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 11 -> 'anon_inode:[eventfd]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 12 -> 'anon_inode:[eventfd]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 13 -> 'socket:[15986]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 14 -> 'anon_inode:[eventfd]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 2 16:55 2 -> 'socket:[16932]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 3 -> 'socket:[16951]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 4 -> 'anon_inode:[eventpoll]'
lr-x------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 5 -> 'pipe:[16952]'
l-wx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 6 -> 'pipe:[16952]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 7 -> /data/mender/mender-store-lock
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 8 -> /data/mender/mender-store
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 Jan 10 09:18 9 -> /data/mender/mender-store
```
---
### Author:  [@kacf](https://hub.mender.io/u/kacf)
#### Post date: [January 12, 2022, 6:35am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453/4 "2022-01-12T06:35:17Z")
Hmm, I would have expected a far greater number of entries. In your first post, mender had more than 700 open file descriptors. Why does it have so few in the next post? Can you try to match the two?
---
### Author:  [@Jerry](https://hub.mender.io/u/Jerry)
#### Post date: [January 13, 2022, 9:35am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453/5 "2022-01-13T09:35:37Z")
> [@kacf](#):
>
> Can you try to match the two?
Here is the two command line launched at the same time
```auto
:~# lsof | awk '{print $1}' | sort | uniq -c | sort -r -n | head
516 mender
507 mender-co
285 python
180 colord
159 systemd
102 systemd-t
72 wpa_suppl
69 systemd-j
60 rngd
59 (sd-pam)
:~# ls -l /proc/$(pgrep '^mender$')/fd
total 0
lr-x------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 09:57 0 -> /dev/null
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 09:57 1 -> 'socket:[16017]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 10 -> 'anon_inode:[eventfd]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 11 -> 'anon_inode:[eventfd]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 12 -> 'socket:[48668]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 13 -> 'socket:[15182]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 14 -> 'anon_inode:[eventfd]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 09:57 2 -> 'socket:[16017]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 3 -> 'socket:[15173]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 4 -> 'anon_inode:[eventpoll]'
lr-x------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 5 -> 'pipe:[15174]'
l-wx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 6 -> 'pipe:[15174]'
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 7 -> /data/mender/mender-store-lock
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 8 -> /data/mender/mender-store
lrwx------ 1 root root 64 13 janv. 10:33 9 -> /data/mender/mender-store
```
---
### Author:  [@kacf](https://hub.mender.io/u/kacf)
#### Post date: [January 14, 2022, 6:56am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453/6 "2022-01-14T06:56:44Z")
Looks like `lsof` lists a lot of extra things as well, such as memory mappings. It also relists everything for every thread which exists in the process, even though they share the open file descriptors, which artificially increases the number a lot. So I would trust the data from `/proc` more.
However, I could confirm that quite a few descriptors were being held open by the `/etc/mender/scripts/version` file, which I fixed in the pull request mentioned in my first reply. I would retry with this patch.
---
### Author:  [@Jerry](https://hub.mender.io/u/Jerry)
#### Post date: [January 14, 2022, 9:39am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453/7 "2022-01-14T09:39:31Z")
Thanks for your reply.
To apply the patch, do i need to compile things or is it just a matter of replacing a file ?
---
### Author:  [@kacf](https://hub.mender.io/u/kacf)
#### Post date: [January 14, 2022, 9:55am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453/8 "2022-01-14T09:55:47Z")
You need to compile.
But you could also just wait. We are working on making new releases as we speak, so it won’t be too long before they are out and available as binary packages.
---
### Author:  [@Jerry](https://hub.mender.io/u/Jerry)
#### Post date: [January 14, 2022, 10:11am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/mender-and-ulimit-number-of-open-files-on-raspbian/4453/9 "2022-01-14T10:11:19Z")
Thanks for help