[Building Sakai] Followup on production issue with Lesson Builder

Tue Jan 14 09:11:28 PST 2014

I just filed a JIRA that I think would help with the multiple import issue.

SAK-25541

It adds a transaction history in the database of what the source site and tools were imported, and also keeps track of current running imports and won't allow a 2nd import if there is already one running.

From: sakai-dev-bounces at collab.sakaiproject.org [mailto:sakai-dev-bounces at collab.sakaiproject.org] On Behalf Of May, Megan Marie
Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2014 11:47 AM
To: sakai-dev (sakai-dev at collab.sakaiproject.org)
Subject: [Building Sakai] Followup on production issue with Lesson Builder

All,
    IU is testing SAK-23897 for implementation in the short term.      I think that the community should consider porting this back to the 2.9.x code line.

Additionally, I think changes need to be made to Lesson Builder and/or the import process.   That it's really easy to create 'orphaned' (archived) records in Lesson builder.  These are items that show up under the 'Index of Pages' but are not available when a faculty member first loads the Lessons tool.

There are a few ways to go about creating these types of items :

*         Remove/Add Lesson tool via Site Setup

*         Import from Site using replace functionality

*         Import timing out: each time many  records are still created but it's not apparent to user.  Timeout happens when there are too many.

*         User decides not to link to a page any longer.   They click to delete but that doesn't really happen

If you think about a faculty getting impatient waiting for the import & running it multiple times . . . . . the problem grows exponentially. Below are some suggestions we brainstormed to address the root of the problem:

*                    Import from Site (Replace option) - Should delete the records rather than move them into orphaned/archive state

*                    When a user deletes an item via the UI, it should indicate it's just being removed from this page and it's available from the archive

*                    Import from site should only copy/merge over 'active' pages

Thoughts?
Megan

From: Bryan Holladay [mailto:holladay at longsight.com]
Sent: Monday, January 13, 2014 1:15 PM
To: May, Megan Marie
Cc: Neal Caidin; Kirschner, Beth; sakai-dev (sakai-dev at collab.sakaiproject.org<mailto:sakai-dev at collab.sakaiproject.org>)
Subject: Re: [Building Sakai] Production issue with Lesson Builder

>When did Longsight introduce the code
I introduced our solution to alleviate the Lesson Builder import problem in the beginning of the Fall semester last year.  The jira was created on Sept 4th 2013.  We probably ran into the bug a few days prior to that.  We notified our clients and updated the ones who were willing to update, so the majority of our 2.9 instances have this patch.  We have several people starting their first week this week, but I don't have a number for that.

Once again, this patch doesn't address LB specifically and is more about a larger problem with site import running in the user's thread.  However, it was the LB import that we saw causing the biggest issue and was the catalyst for this, which is why the jira only briefly mentions LB.  I would love to hear what Chuck H. has to add about the LB import code itself.

-Bryan

On Mon, Jan 13, 2014 at 12:25 PM, May, Megan Marie <mmmay at iu.edu<mailto:mmmay at iu.edu>> wrote:
Our testing didn't show that LSNBLDR-304<https://jira.sakaiproject.org/browse/LSNBLDR-304> was the solution.

And thanks Bryan.    We also tracked down the faculty member to ask them to stop.  Thank goodness they were a good sport about it!     When did Longsight introduce the code (and have any schools been through the first week or so?

Megan

From: sakai-dev-bounces at collab.sakaiproject.org<mailto:sakai-dev-bounces at collab.sakaiproject.org> [mailto:sakai-dev-bounces at collab.sakaiproject.org<mailto:sakai-dev-bounces at collab.sakaiproject.org>] On Behalf Of Neal Caidin
Sent: Monday, January 13, 2014 10:51 AM
To: Kirschner, Beth

Cc: sakai-dev (sakai-dev at collab.sakaiproject.org<mailto:sakai-dev at collab.sakaiproject.org>)
Subject: Re: [Building Sakai] Production issue with Lesson Builder

Is it related to this one

https://jira.sakaiproject.org/browse/LSNBLDR-304   ?

-- Neal

[cid:image001.jpg at 01CF1121.C0A25210]
Kirschner, Beth<mailto:bkirschn at umich.edu>
January 13, 2014 at 10:45 AM
Is this written up in JIRA anywhere?

- Beth

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Bryan Holladay<mailto:holladay at longsight.com>
January 13, 2014 at 10:39 AM
>Does that help with the excessive number of items?

Yes and no.  It prevents the excessive number of orphaned pages by the instructor re-importing and deleting the half imported material.  I've seen cases where it takes 10+ minutes for the import to complete, which is why instructor's keep trying the import and causing millions of pages to be created.  We actually had to track the instructor down and tell them to stop importing until we get the fix in since every time we restarted the instructor went back in to re-import.  However, this patch doesn't address the issue inside of LB's import code.  So I'm sure there is room for more improvement, but it seemed like it was the combination of multiple imports + non-performant import code.  The good/bad thing about this issue is that it only comes up in the first week or so of the semester.  So it won't be an issue again until next semester and any fix you add you won't really be certain until then as well.  I'm not going to jinx us by saying everything is going fine so far with that patch with this start of this semester but you can infer that if you wish ;)

Thanks,
Bryan
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May, Megan Marie<mailto:mmmay at iu.edu>
January 13, 2014 at 9:16 AM
Thanks Bryan!     We started looking at that patch last night.

Does that help with the excessive number of items?  Even with 1 import we've seen a high number of duplicate entries (over 1000).
Megan

From: Bryan Holladay [mailto:holladay at longsight.com]
Sent: Monday, January 13, 2014 8:38 AM
To: May, Megan Marie
Cc: sakai-dev (sakai-dev at collab.sakaiproject.org<mailto:sakai-dev at collab.sakaiproject.org>)
Subject: Re: [Building Sakai] Production issue with Lesson Builder

My first assumption would be that it is from importing previous course LB's into the new courses.  We've seen a lot of issues with performance, excessive number of items and server stress with this process.  We created/provided this jira to help alleviate some of the issue:

SAK-23897 Site Info -> Import from site needs to run in a seperate thread and email user when finished

We were seeing instructors importing several times b/c it would either time out or they'd give up on the process and try again (or click several times).  If I wanted to bring down a Sakai server, that is how I would do it (site import with LB)

-Bryan

On Sun, Jan 12, 2014 at 1:22 PM, May, Megan Marie <mmmay at iu.edu<mailto:mmmay at iu.edu>> wrote:
On Friday the following SQL began running for excessive periods of time

update lesson_builder_items set pageId=:1 , sequence=:2 , type=:3 , sakaiId=:4 , name=:5 , html=:6 , description=:7 , height=:8 , width=:9 , alt=:10 , nextPage=:11 , format=:12 , required=:13 , alternate=:14 , prerequisite=:15 , subrequirement=:16 , requirementText=:17 , sameWindow=:18 , groups=:19 , anonymous=:20 , showComments=:21 , forcedCommentsAnonymous=:22 , gradebookId=:23 , gradebookPoints=:24 , gradebookTitle=:25 , altGradebook=:26 , altPoints=:27 , altGradebookTitle=:28 where id=:29

As a stop gap we've bounced the app servers these are occurring on.    We've noted HUGE increases in the number of rows in LESSON_BUILDER_ITEMS  & the increases pertain to  rows in lesson_builder_items show a SAKAIID of "/dummy"  (Import issues?)   The behavior seems like a loop - and we've looked at LSNBLDR-304 although the cause of it is ambiguous so we're hesitant to move forward with it.

Has anyone encountered this?

Megan

Megan May
Manager, Learning Management Systems / Kuali Student Development
UITS Enterprise Student Systems
Enterprise Software Division
Indiana University
Office:  317-274-4528<tel:317-274-4528>

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Bryan Holladay<mailto:holladay at longsight.com>
January 13, 2014 at 8:37 AM
My first assumption would be that it is from importing previous course LB's into the new courses.  We've seen a lot of issues with performance, excessive number of items and server stress with this process.  We created/provided this jira to help alleviate some of the issue:

SAK-23897 Site Info -> Import from site needs to run in a seperate thread and email user when finished

We were seeing instructors importing several times b/c it would either time out or they'd give up on the process and try again (or click several times).  If I wanted to bring down a Sakai server, that is how I would do it (site import with LB)

-Bryan

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May, Megan Marie<mailto:mmmay at iu.edu>
January 12, 2014 at 1:22 PM
On Friday the following SQL began running for excessive periods of time

update lesson_builder_items set pageId=:1 , sequence=:2 , type=:3 , sakaiId=:4 , name=:5 , html=:6 , description=:7 , height=:8 , width=:9 , alt=:10 , nextPage=:11 , format=:12 , required=:13 , alternate=:14 , prerequisite=:15 , subrequirement=:16 , requirementText=:17 , sameWindow=:18 , groups=:19 , anonymous=:20 , showComments=:21 , forcedCommentsAnonymous=:22 , gradebookId=:23 , gradebookPoints=:24 , gradebookTitle=:25 , altGradebook=:26 , altPoints=:27 , altGradebookTitle=:28 where id=:29

As a stop gap we've bounced the app servers these are occurring on.    We've noted HUGE increases in the number of rows in LESSON_BUILDER_ITEMS  & the increases pertain to  rows in lesson_builder_items show a SAKAIID of "/dummy"  (Import issues?)   The behavior seems like a loop - and we've looked at LSNBLDR-304 although the cause of it is ambiguous so we're hesitant to move forward with it.

Has anyone encountered this?

Megan

Megan May
Manager, Learning Management Systems / Kuali Student Development
UITS Enterprise Student Systems
Enterprise Software Division
Indiana University
Office:  317-274-4528<tel:317-274-4528>

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--
Neal Caidin
Sakai Community Coordinator
Apereo Foundation
neal.caidin at apereo.org<mailto:neal.caidin at apereo.org>
Skype me! (but let me know in advance for the first interaction) - nealkdin

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