Question

We are using openfire server 3.7.1 on Amazon Ec2 linux instance for a chat Application.

Currently, we are in initial development stage, where we are testing it with 4 or 5 concurrent users.
Now, and then we are getting issues with openfire server:

1) Java heap space exceptions.

2) java.net.BindException: Address already in use

3) they both lead to 5222 port not listening, while openfire admin console at 9090 is working fine

Eventually when i stop all openfire processes and then restart it, again it goes to normal.

I want to know, whether this is a bug in openfire version 3.7.1 or EC2 have some issues with opening of port 5222. I am really apprehensive about performance of Openfire server when 1000s user will be using it concurrently?

Solved by:

1. Disabling PEP.

2. Increasing Openfire JVM parametres

Answer 1

The Java heap space exception is common to Openfire, you can check your JVM arguments and increase the parameters. In my experience there were a couple of cases that caused those:

• clients using Empathy.
• some plugin that provided buddy lists/ white/black lists etc (had to do something with the user’s roster lists).

You need to make sure port 5222 and 5223 are opened (some clients may use the old SSL port) in EC2 Firewall settings.

If you plan to have thousands of users, I suggest you get static IP address (you don’t mention what’s your current config). Also checkout jabberd – proved to be more reliable than openfire.