# Dynamically Start/Stop FastCGI PHP Processes **URL:** \ **Category:** NGINX\ **Created:** [March 15, 2012, 4:31am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/dynamically-start-stop-fastcgi-php-processes/217875 "2012-03-15T04:31:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![luislavena](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/l/0ea827/32.png) [@luislavena](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/luislavena)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2012, 4:31am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/dynamically-start-stop-fastcgi-php-processes/217875/1 "2012-03-15T04:31:02Z")
Ok, so I’ve got a crazy idea, but it might just work. Basically, we have a bunch of PHP pools managed with PHP-FPM. Each site has its own single PHP-FPM worker for security reasons. The majority of the sites don’t get much traffic, so the PHP processes don’t need to be running eating up RAM and resources. My thought was after N number of minutes of no requests to shut down that PHP worker for that site. Then when a request comes in, hold the request in sort-of a pause mode, start the worker for that site, and then forward off the request. Sure there would be a slight delay on that first request to spin up the worker, but should work beautifully. Does nginx have any plugins to emulate this behavior? I.E. sort of hooks? All I would need is a hook from nginx when a site is idle for X number of second/minutes. For this first hook, we could write a simple bash script which kills that PHP-FPM worker. Then another hook, when a request comes in on a given site. Again, another bash script which first checks if the PHP-FPM worker is up, if not, holds the requests, starts the worker, and then forwards the request. I was thinking at first, I can use node.js and write a middleware proxy that sits between nginx and the PHP-FPM workers, but then quickly realized the node.js app would have to speak cgi, and I didn’t want to have to deal with that rubbish. 🙂 Posted at Nginx Forum: > **[Dynamically Start/Stop FastCGI PHP Processes](https://forum.nginx.org/read.php?2,223855,223855#msg-223855)** > > Ok, so I've got a crazy idea, but it might just work. Basically, we have a bunch of PHP pools managed with PHP-FPM. Each site has its own single PHP-FPM worker for security reasons. The majority of the sites don't get much traffic, so the PHP... ---
**Author:** ![justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/3ab097/32.png) [@justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/justin)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2012, 4:38am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/dynamically-start-stop-fastcgi-php-processes/217875/2 "2012-03-15T04:38:36Z")
Am 15.03.2012 10:30 schrieb “justin” [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid): > a pause mode, start the worker for that site, and then forward off the > > I was thinking at first, I can use node.js and write a middleware proxy > that sits between nginx and the PHP-FPM workers, but then quickly > realized the node.js app would have to speak cgi, and I didn’t want to > have to deal with that rubbish. 🙂 What you’re looking for is php-fpm with 0 initial worker. I’m not sure how far its current progress but you should try asking php folks. In the meantime you can config the pool to start with only one inital worker. ---
**Author:** ![justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/3ab097/32.png) [@justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/justin)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2012, 4:53am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/dynamically-start-stop-fastcgi-php-processes/217875/3 "2012-03-15T04:53:32Z")
Awesome idea, but the minium appears to be 1. I tried 0 and get the following: Starting php-fpm: [14-Mar-2012 20:52:28] WARNING: [pool justin] pm.start\_servers is not set. It’s been set to 1. [14-Mar-2012 20:52:28] WARNING: [pool simon] pm.start\_servers is not set. It’s been set to 1. Posted at Nginx Forum: > **[Re: Dynamically Start/Stop FastCGI PHP Processes](https://forum.nginx.org/read.php?2,223855,223857#msg-223857)** > > Ok, so I've got a crazy idea, but it might just work. Basically, we have a bunch of PHP pools managed with PHP-FPM. Each site has its own single PHP-FPM worker for security reasons. The majority of the sites don't get much traffic, so the PHP... ---
**Author:** ![justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/3ab097/32.png) [@justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/justin)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2012, 4:56am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/dynamically-start-stop-fastcgi-php-processes/217875/4 "2012-03-15T04:56:01Z")
Am 15.03.2012 10:53 schrieb “justin” [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid): > Awesome idea, but the minium appears to be 1. I tried 0 and get the > following: Yes, it is work in progress. ---
**Author:** ![justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/3ab097/32.png) [@justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/justin)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2012, 5:39am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/dynamically-start-stop-fastcgi-php-processes/217875/5 "2012-03-15T05:39:07Z")
Edho, Appears to be working, commented out other directives such as max\_workers. Added the following: pm = ondemand pm.process\_idle\_timeout = 60 pm.max\_children = 1 Posted at Nginx Forum: > **[Re: Dynamically Start/Stop FastCGI PHP Processes](https://forum.nginx.org/read.php?2,223855,223861#msg-223861)** > > Ok, so I've got a crazy idea, but it might just work. Basically, we have a bunch of PHP pools managed with PHP-FPM. Each site has its own single PHP-FPM worker for security reasons. The majority of the sites don't get much traffic, so the PHP... ---
**Author:** ![justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/3ab097/32.png) [@justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/justin)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2012, 9:42am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/dynamically-start-stop-fastcgi-php-processes/217875/6 "2012-03-15T09:42:01Z")
On 03/15/2012 04:30 AM, justin wrote: > request. Sure there would be a slight delay on that first request to > I was thinking at first, I can use node.js and write a middleware proxy > that sits between nginx and the PHP-FPM workers, but then quickly > realized the node.js app would have to speak cgi, and I didn’t want to > have to deal with that rubbish. 🙂 php-fpm support ‘ondemand’ governor so it will spawn processes as-needed and kill them after specified period if not needed (keeping zero workers for pool). This is what you are looking for. – Piotr. ---
**Author:** ![justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/3ab097/32.png) [@justin](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/justin)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2012, 11:22am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/dynamically-start-stop-fastcgi-php-processes/217875/7 "2012-03-15T11:22:21Z")
On 03/15/2012 09:39 AM, Piotr K. wrote: > On 03/15/2012 04:30 AM, justin wrote: > > that sits between nginx and the PHP-FPM workers, but then quickly > > realized the node.js app would have to speak cgi, and I didn’t want to > > have to deal with that rubbish. 🙂 > > php-fpm support ‘ondemand’ governor so it will spawn processes as-needed > and kill them after specified period if not needed (keeping zero workers > for pool). This is what you are looking for. I’d be interested, whether there is something generic nginx specific, which would allow to start / stop any fast-cgi / uwsgi service. I think it could be rather intersting for a lot of rarely used services where a startup penalty is not important.