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Process Reference  
Process Engine Administration
Workflow administration tasks
System administration tasks
  Configuring the Process Engine
  Configuring users and groups (Workplace)
  Configuring users and groups (Open Client/FileNet Web Services Client)
  Configuring optional features
  Running the Process Engine
  Improving system performance
    Reducing the number of isolated regions
    Adjusting performance parameters for an isolated region
    Using loadstatus to monitor the server load
  Troubleshooting
   

Reducing the number of isolated regions

If your system’s performance lowers dramatically, and the Process Engine disk drive begins “thrashing” (continually swapping out sections of memory to disk), one possible cause is that too many isolated regions are in use at a given time.

When an application logs on to the VWService, the Process Engine checks to see if the data for that isolated region has been loaded into memory—and if not, loads it into memory. This can quickly use up all the server’s memory, causing the symptoms noted above.

The ideal maximum number of isolated regions in a VWService is five, regardless of the physical memory on a server. However, if you have memory allocated to processes other than the Process Engine, or do not have the physical memory necessary on a server, you can run into performance problems with less than five isolated regions.

The solution to this problem is to either temporarily reduce the number of isolated regions in use at a given time, or permanently reduce the number of isolated regions in the service. An alternative is adding another VWService (and therefore a server) and populating one or more regions in that service.

View the number of isolated regions

Use the regions command in the vwtool utility to view a list of all the isolated regions loaded in memory, or all the isolated regions defined in the VWService.

Temporarily reduce system resource usage

To temporarily reduce the system resource usage problems caused by too many isolated regions in a service, ensure that fewer isolated regions have a PC workstation or server logged on at one time.

While this temporarily alleviates system resource problems, a more efficient strategy is to rework your isolated region configuration for the service, then remove the data from the unused isolated regions.

Permanently reduce the number of isolated regions

Take the following steps to permanently reduce the number of isolated regions:

CAUTION This procedure deletes all data for the isolated region(s) removed from the Process Engine workflow database, as well as all work items in the isolated region(s) removed. If you currently have data in the workflow database, we recommend backing up all the servers in your VWService, in case you wish to revert the service to its pre-initialization state.

Determine the number of isolated regions that are necessary for the VWService, and which PC workstations belong in which isolated region.

Note that the ideal maximum number of isolated regions in a service is five; for more information on isolated regions and Process Engine configurations, see Using isolated regions to separate groups of users.

Use the Remove Isolated Region option in the Process Configuration Console to remove the isolated region(s) from the service.