How to set ulimits on service with systemd?

Question

How would you set a ulimit on a systemd service unit?

This stackoverflow question explains that systemd ignores system ulimits

What would the syntax look like to set the following ulimits?

ulimit -c
ulimit -v
ulimit -m

[Unit]
Description=Apache Solr
After=syslog.target network.target remote-fs.target nss-lookup.target

[Service]
Type=forking
SOLR_INSTALL_DIR=/opt/solr
SOLR_ENV=/etc/default/solr.in.sh
RUNAS=solr

SOLR_PID_DIR="/var/solr"
SOLR_HOME="/opt/solr/server/solr"
LOG4J_PROPS="/var/solr/log4j.properties"
SOLR_LOGS_DIR="/opt/solr/server/logs"
SOLR_PORT="8389"

PIDFile=/var/solr/solr-8389.pid
ExecStart=/opt/solr/bin/solr start
ExecStatus=/opt/solr/bin/solr status
ExecStop=/opt/solr/bin/solr stop
Restart=on-failure
User=solr

SuccessExitStatus=143 0

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Solution

The mappings of systemd limits to ulimit

Directive        ulimit equivalent     Unit
LimitCPU=        ulimit -t             Seconds      
LimitFSIZE=      ulimit -f             Bytes
LimitDATA=       ulimit -d             Bytes
LimitSTACK=      ulimit -s             Bytes
LimitCORE=       ulimit -c             Bytes
LimitRSS=        ulimit -m             Bytes
LimitNOFILE=     ulimit -n             Number of File Descriptors 
LimitAS=         ulimit -v             Bytes
LimitNPROC=      ulimit -u             Number of Processes 
LimitMEMLOCK=    ulimit -l             Bytes
LimitLOCKS=      ulimit -x             Number of Locks 
LimitSIGPENDING= ulimit -i             Number of Queued Signals 
LimitMSGQUEUE=   ulimit -q             Bytes
LimitNICE=       ulimit -e             Nice Level 
LimitRTPRIO=     ulimit -r             Realtime Priority  
LimitRTTIME=     No equivalent

If a ulimit is set to 'unlimited' set it to 'infinity' in the systemd config

ulimit -c unlimited is the same as LimitCORE=infinity
ulimit -v unlimited is the same as LimitAS=infinity
ulimit -m unlimited is the same as LimitRSS=infinity

So a final config would look like

[Unit]
Description=Apache Solr
After=syslog.target network.target remote-fs.target nss-lookup.target

[Service]
WorkingDirectory=/opt/solr/server
User=solr
Group=solr
LimitAS=infinity
LimitRSS=infinity
LimitCORE=infinity
LimitNOFILE=65536
ExecStart=/opt/solr/bin/solr-foo
Restart=on-failure
SuccessExitStatus=143 0
SyslogIdentifier=solr


[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

In this particular case, I don't know the full java path (since it changes based on server type), and systemd isn't happy about relative paths, I wrap the java command in a simple bash script located at /opt/solr/bin/solr-foo

#!/bin/bash

. /opt/solr/bin/solr.in.sh

# Load $JAVA_HOME from 1 of 2 places where it could be defined
# Last one wins
if [[ -f "/etc/profile.d/jdk.sh" ]]; then
  . /etc/profile.d/jdk.sh
fi

if [[ -f "/etc/profile.d/zing.sh" ]]; then
  . /etc/profile.d/zing.sh
fi

exec ${JAVA_HOME}/bin/java -server \
  -Djetty.port=${SOLR_PORT} \
  ${SOLR_JAVA_MEM} \
  ${GC_TUNE} \
  ${GC_LOG_OPTS} \
  -DzkClientTimeout=${ZK_CLIENT_TIMEOUT} \
  -DzkHost=${ZK_HOST} \
  -DSTOP.PORT=7900 \
  -DSTOP.KEY=foobar \
  -Dhost=${SOLR_HOST} \
  -Duser.timezone=${SOLR_TIMEZONE} \
  -Djetty.home=/opt/solr/server \
  -Dsolr.solr.home=${SOLR_HOME} \
  -Dsolr.install.dir=/opt/solr \
  -Dlog4j.configuration=file:/var/solr/log4j.properties \
  -Xss256k \
  -Dbootstrap_conf=true \
  -Dbootstrap_confdir=/opt/solr/server/solr/configsets/foobar/conf \
  -Dcollection.configName=foobar \
  -jar start.jar --module=http

Comments

[Totor]

Search for "Limit" in man 5 systemd.exec.

[JdeBP]

I wouldn't call that "final". It still needs all of those messed-up settings like RUNAS and SOLR_ENV either corrected or removed. And then there's all of the hooplah in the bin/solr shell script that is completely unnecessary under a service manager.

[Tony Anderson]

Thanks for pointing that out. I've updated the answer with a cleaner solution that puts all variables in 1 location and doesn't use the bloated bin/solr script.

[JdeBP]

See unix.stackexchange.com/a/320319/5132 for still more that can be fixed, starting with using exec in the shell script.

[Ruslan Neruka]

Thank you wery much. Spent a lot of time until found your post and realize difference in units between systemd (byte) and ulimit (kb)