I am looking for some guidance on Planetpress Folder Pick Optimization, we are currently experiencing delays when picking a large number of small files from a samba network share.
When there are say 500-1000 small files dropped in the network share sometimes it’s taking over an hour for Planetpress to pick up the last one.
We have multiple processes (around 40 processes) doing the pickup picks up from multiple folders at the same time and our processes mainly consist of a pdf mask being applied to the data file and then LPR’ing to a print server or back to network folder.
We have turned self replication on some of the processes which does speed it up that process, but worried about it using for all processes due to server resource.
We do have a simple process that runs in the early hours that just picks up files and moves to a local folder on the Planetpress server and that can pick up 1000 files in a minute, so maybe we are thinking the process of appling a PDF Mask and then LPR is adding on time to the pick up the next file but are there any options to attempt to make the pickup quicker.
We have seen an option on the percentage of self replication threads which maybe allow us to have more threads to pick up more, but just looking for any advice from the OL community.
Do not branch in Workflow unless necessary. Evrytime you branch, a copy of the input file is made. Small files aren’t an issue but big files ( with the action of the anti-virus should you have not setup the proper white listing) can slow things a lot.
Setup a white list (exceptions) in your antivirus for all folder structures which your Workflow processes interacts with.
See if you can increase the resouces of your PlanetPress server.
In addition to jchamel’s tips, I would like to point out that whenever you access network shares, there is some level of authentication that needs to ocur in the background (which does not occur when you access a local folder). Workflow has no control over that authentication process, it’s built in the operating system.
This could explain a lot of the slowdown you`re experiencing. It would also explain why your early morning process is more efficient because after it has moved all the files, they get picked up locally by Workflow.
And to add to that, you could also look at your Workflow logs to figure out where the bottleneck is. You’ll see in those logs that you can see how much time it took for each and every steps of each processes.
You might also want to look at the logs of the LPR server helper. See how much time it takes for each files you sent to the printer(s). Could be that said printer is becoming overwhelmed and becomes unresponsive, adding delay tothe whole things.
Make sure your logs are setup to All events with details as to see as much info as you can. You can change the log levels by clicking on the big left hand corner orange button with a W in the middle. Then go to Preferences->Plug-in->General->Log level