IIS 6.0 locking up

I have an IIS 6.0 on W2K3 server sitting in one of our DMZs. All of the
patches should be up-to-date. Starting last Thursday, users complained of no
response from the application. From the web it appeared as though the site
was down. Looking from the Event Viewer and the Admin Consoles, everything
was running normally without any errors. I ended up issuing an 'IISRESET'
command to get the site back up. Less than an hour later, it occurred again.
This time, I rebooted the server. On Friday, it happened in the
morning-reboot. And then it happened again late afternoon and I used
'IISRESET'. Nothing again until Saturday afternoon and I used 'IISRESET'.
Nothing on Sunday and so far today nothing has occurred. It has me rather
concerned as this is a new site for us replacing some older software. It is
pretty important we keep access up 24x7 without unexplained downtimes. I am
not familiar enough with IIS and cannot seem to find what is actually
causing the web server to hang. Does anyone have a suggestion as to what it
could be or where to even begin? Thanks!

Re: IIS 6.0 locking up

Hi,

First of all, i would check these places:
- Event log
- IIS log file
- httperr log file
- Use WFetch to see what is actually returned by IIS (if anything)

If nothing above gives any result, i would do this:

- Does it work locally?
If yes, then it is not likely to be a problem with IIS. Start by checking
network issues.

- Is it isolated to one specific website (application pool)?
If yes, then it is likely to be a problem with a specific application.
Debug that application.

- If IIS truly "hangs" and nothing works, use Crash/Hang agent
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=01c 4f89d-cc68-42ba-98d2-0c580437efcf&displaylang=en

or Debug Diagnostic Tool v1.1
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=28b d5941-c458-46f1-b24d-f60151d875a3&displaylang=en



--
Regards,
Kristofer Gafvert
http://www.gafvert.info/iis/ - IIS Related Info


Wendell Crain wrote:

>I have an IIS 6.0 on W2K3 server sitting in one of our DMZs. All of the
>patches should be up-to-date. Starting last Thursday, users complained of
>no response from the application. From the web it appeared as though the
>site was down. Looking from the Event Viewer and the Admin Consoles,
>everything was running normally without any errors. I ended up issuing an
>'IISRESET' command to get the site back up. Less than an hour later, it
>occurred again. This time, I rebooted the server. On Friday, it happened
>in the morning-reboot. And then it happened again late afternoon and I
>used 'IISRESET'. Nothing again until Saturday afternoon and I used
>'IISRESET'. Nothing on Sunday and so far today nothing has occurred. It
>has me rather concerned as this is a new site for us replacing some older
>software. It is pretty important we keep access up 24x7 without
>unexplained downtimes. I am not familiar enough with IIS and cannot seem
>to find what is actually causing the web server to hang. Does anyone have
>a suggestion as to what it could be or where to even begin? Thanks!

Re: IIS 6.0 locking up

On Nov 19, 11:03 am, "Wendell Crain" wrote:
> I have an IIS 6.0 on W2K3 server sitting in one of our DMZs. All of the
> patches should be up-to-date. Starting last Thursday, users complained of no
> response from the application. From the web it appeared as though the site
> was down. Looking from the Event Viewer and the Admin Consoles, everything
> was running normally without any errors. I ended up issuing an 'IISRESET'
> command to get the site back up. Less than an hour later, it occurred again.
> This time, I rebooted the server. On Friday, it happened in the
> morning-reboot. And then it happened again late afternoon and I used
> 'IISRESET'. Nothing again until Saturday afternoon and I used 'IISRESET'.
> Nothing on Sunday and so far today nothing has occurred. It has me rather
> concerned as this is a new site for us replacing some older software. It is
> pretty important we keep access up 24x7 without unexplained downtimes. I am
> not familiar enough with IIS and cannot seem to find what is actually
> causing the web server to hang. Does anyone have a suggestion as to what it
> could be or where to even begin? Thanks!


Start here:
http://blogs.msdn.com/david.wang/archive/2005/12/31/HOWTO_Ba sics_of_IIS6_Troubleshooting.aspx

Depending on the outcome of that investigation, you may proceed to
this:
http://blogs.msdn.com/david.wang/archive/2005/08/29/HOWTO_Un derstand_and_Diagnose_an_AppPool_Crash.aspx


My suspicion is that this is not an IIS issue. I suspect your new
website application has performance problems that periodically
manifests itself, more recently now. For example, it may be using a
database on the backend, and that database is having performance
problems after being in use for some time -- which hangs up the
requests on the front end and makes it LOOK like the webserver is not
responding when in fact it is waiting on the backend.

Anyhow, that's just a random guess -- the troubleshooting steps and
stack backtraces you gather from instructions in the blog entry will
give lots more information. I am just trying to dispel your
predisposition that this hanging problem with the web server when
historically, it tends to be a problem with the web application
running on the web server.

And why are you on the hotseat and not the developers of the new
website? Their website is hanging; so get them to investigate and fix
it! As soon as you ran IISRESET, it means that the developer should be
responsible. On IIS6, you should not need to run IISRESET -- you
should just recycle/restart the Application Pool of the website that
is hanging. IISRESET is basically banned for IIS6 and exists only
because people got used to it with IIS5.


//David
http://w3-4u.blogspot.com
http://blogs.msdn.com/David.Wang
//

Re: IIS 6.0 locking up

Kristofer,

Great suggestions. Thanks! I will try this next time this occurs. It didn't
happen at all yesterday.


"Kristofer Gafvert" wrote in message
news:xn0fdw3jxvwmpjz01l@news.microsoft.com...
> Hi,
>
> First of all, i would check these places:
> - Event log
> - IIS log file
> - httperr log file
> - Use WFetch to see what is actually returned by IIS (if anything)
>
> If nothing above gives any result, i would do this:
>
> - Does it work locally?
> If yes, then it is not likely to be a problem with IIS. Start by checking
> network issues.
>
> - Is it isolated to one specific website (application pool)?
> If yes, then it is likely to be a problem with a specific application.
> Debug that application.
>
> - If IIS truly "hangs" and nothing works, use Crash/Hang agent
> http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=01c 4f89d-cc68-42ba-98d2-0c580437efcf&displaylang=en
>
> or Debug Diagnostic Tool v1.1
> http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=28b d5941-c458-46f1-b24d-f60151d875a3&displaylang=en
>
>
>
> --
> Regards,
> Kristofer Gafvert
> http://www.gafvert.info/iis/ - IIS Related Info

Re: IIS 6.0 locking up

David,

Thanks for the information. It will definitely come in useful in determining
the cause. You may be correct that it is the application. Hopefully that can
be resolved soon. I ran across the IISRESET command using google. I wasn't
aware that it had issues for the web server. I will try resetting the pool
next time. I am normally on the development side of things, not the
administration side so I am learning as I go.


"David Wang" wrote in message
news:69a1779b-5753-4e91-b570-17e14e2e6e97@s12g2000prg.google groups.com...
> Start here:
> http://blogs.msdn.com/david.wang/archive/2005/12/31/HOWTO_Ba sics_of_IIS6_Troubleshooting.aspx
>
> Depending on the outcome of that investigation, you may proceed to
> this:
> http://blogs.msdn.com/david.wang/archive/2005/08/29/HOWTO_Un derstand_and_Diagnose_an_AppPool_Crash.aspx
>
>
> My suspicion is that this is not an IIS issue. I suspect your new
> website application has performance problems that periodically
> manifests itself, more recently now. For example, it may be using a
> database on the backend, and that database is having performance
> problems after being in use for some time -- which hangs up the
> requests on the front end and makes it LOOK like the webserver is not
> responding when in fact it is waiting on the backend.
>
> Anyhow, that's just a random guess -- the troubleshooting steps and
> stack backtraces you gather from instructions in the blog entry will
> give lots more information. I am just trying to dispel your
> predisposition that this hanging problem with the web server when
> historically, it tends to be a problem with the web application
> running on the web server.
>
> And why are you on the hotseat and not the developers of the new
> website? Their website is hanging; so get them to investigate and fix
> it! As soon as you ran IISRESET, it means that the developer should be
> responsible. On IIS6, you should not need to run IISRESET -- you
> should just recycle/restart the Application Pool of the website that
> is hanging. IISRESET is basically banned for IIS6 and exists only
> because people got used to it with IIS5.
>
>
> //David
> http://w3-4u.blogspot.com
> http://blogs.msdn.com/David.Wang
> //