TimeOut Change: Good/Bad??

[sucram]

Hi,

I want to change the TimeOut value of my server to 10 mins from 5. People are scared but cannot give me a valid reason why.

Can anyone tell me if this is a bad idea and if so why?

The reason for the change is, I have a report that is taking 6-8 mins to run. In the process of fixing the report so this will on be a temporary solution.

Thanks,
Marcus

 

[NullTerminator]

This could make your server unavailable for other requests if too many request are waiting for the timeout. Apache has a limit configuration for number or worker threads to service requests.

\0

 

[lgarner]

If the site is functioning normally, I can't imagine very many requests that aren't served in 5 minutes. NullTerminator is right, the timeout increase could increase open connections and lead to a DOS.

However, there's nothing magical about 5 minutes. I could say that it is a terrible setting when compared to 2 minutes. If you need it, you need it. If you want to play it safe you could increment it slowly and watch the site's performance.

I have one server set to a 1-hour timeout for this reason. I'm not crazy about it, but what can you do? It normally takes over 20 minutes for a data import routine.