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I'm running Apache 2.4.25 on a Raspberry Pi 3A+ with Raspbian Stretch and every first request after booting takes several minutes. The connection does not break it just loads forever.

So far I have:

  • made sure that the system is reachable via SSH. So I don't think it's a network issue.
  • made sure apache is up-to-date and running via systemctl status apache2
  • checked syslog for apache via journalctl -u apache2.service. Neither this nor apaches access and error logs show anything before the first request is served.
  • monitored cpu and memory use using htop. System is not overwhelmed.

Looking at the output of systemctl status apache2 makes me think it has something to do with number of worker processes being spawned by apache. After boot it shows just the main process:

● apache2.service - The Apache HTTP Server
   Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/apache2.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
   Active: active (running) since Mon 2019-04-15 10:54:08 UTC; 3min 33s ago
  Process: 482 ExecStart=/usr/sbin/apachectl start (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
 Main PID: 775 (apache2)
      CPU: 303ms
   CGroup: /system.slice/apache2.service
           └─775 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start

Apr 15 10:54:07 a_test systemd[1]: Starting The Apache HTTP Server...
Apr 15 10:54:08 a_test systemd[1]: Started The Apache HTTP Server.

When I try to connect via http (using Opera 58 on Win 10) the page will load for somewhere between 2 and 10 minutes. The moment the page loads is also the moment apache spawns child processes. It will spawn 6 processes which I guess is 1 to serve the request and 5 spare as is the default in mpm_prefork.conf. It will also spawn these child processes without any requests after 5-10 minutes:

● apache2.service - The Apache HTTP Server
   Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/apache2.service; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
   Active: active (running) since Mon 2019-04-15 11:07:03 UTC; 10min ago
  Process: 481 ExecStart=/usr/sbin/apachectl start (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
 Main PID: 780 (apache2)
      CPU: 418ms
   CGroup: /system.slice/apache2.service
           ├─ 780 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start
           ├─3682 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start
           ├─3683 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start
           ├─3684 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start
           ├─3685 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start
           └─3686 /usr/sbin/apache2 -k start

Apr 15 11:07:02 a_test systemd[1]: Starting The Apache HTTP Server...
Apr 15 11:07:03 a_test systemd[1]: Started The Apache HTTP Server.

But why does it wait so long? I say wait, because the system does not seem busy - virtually no CPU use and lots of free memory.

Once it has child processes the web page is working fine. I also tried restarting or stopping and starting the service via systemctl. However in these cases apache will start with 6 child processes and serve requests immediately. After a reboot it will act as described above.

At this point I don't really know what to do anymore. Web searches for apache and workers or processes or things like that almost always lead to discussion about how to avoid more spawning rather than the opposite.

Configurations are mostly default:

apache.conf: https://hastebin.com/pasajesuqe.apache

only virtualhost: https://hastebin.com/onozijadud.apache

mpm_prefork:

<IfModule mpm_prefork_module> StartServers 5 MinSpareServers 5 MaxSpareServers 10 MaxRequestWorkers 150 MaxConnectionsPerChild 0 </IfModule>

mods-enabled:

access_compat.load  authz_core.load  deflate.load  mime.load         php7.0.load      status.load
alias.conf          authz_host.load  dir.conf      mpm_prefork.conf  reqtimeout.conf
alias.load          authz_user.load  dir.load      mpm_prefork.load  reqtimeout.load
auth_basic.load     autoindex.conf   env.load      negotiation.conf  setenvif.conf
authn_core.load     autoindex.load   filter.load   negotiation.load  setenvif.load
authn_file.load     deflate.conf     mime.conf     php7.0.conf       status.conf

Additional information requested by user grawity:

$ sudo cat /proc/775/stack
[] 0xffffffff

$ sudo cat /proc/775/task/775/stack
[] 0xffffffff

$ sudo cat /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail
94
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  • Can you show the contents of /proc/<pid>/stack and /proc/<pid>/task/*/stack for the Apache master process (the one with lowest PID), while it's still "hung" immediately after a reboot?
    – grawity
    Apr 17, 2019 at 11:29
  • Wow, that was quick! I will add the information first thing tomorrow. Thanks!
    – pmallot
    Apr 17, 2019 at 11:40
  • 2
    (While you're at it, also check /proc/sys/kernel/random/entropy_avail as that's probably the most common problem)
    – grawity
    Apr 17, 2019 at 11:58
  • @grawity I have added the requested information.
    – pmallot
    Apr 18, 2019 at 8:58
  • @grawity Thanks to your hint about entropy I was able to fix my problem and posted an answer. Should you want to post one yourself I will accept yours instead.
    – pmallot
    Apr 23, 2019 at 10:27

1 Answer 1

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Going of the comment made by @grawity (Thanks!) and what I read in an article on hackaday.com, I was able to fix my problem by installing the package rng-tools.

As far as I now understand it, this was the problem:
Apache needs a minimum amount of entropy to spawn workers. The RPi not having any input devices and having just booted up was struggling to collect enough entropy. While it does have a hardware (pseudo) random number generator, the RPi needs to have the package rng-tools installed to actually feed that entropy into the system entropy pool.

Installing the rng-tools package immediately increased available entropy from less than 100 to over 2000 and apache workers were started.
Workers are now also started directly on boot.

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