Server load issues

I have FastCGI running on a server for some ruby applications. Over the
past week, the load on this server will start to slowly climb and suck
up all the swap/ram... until it has to be rebooted. 

Here is the basic configuration that I have for mod_fastcgi:

> <IfModule mod_fastcgi.c>
>     FastCgiIpcDir /tmp/fcgi_ipc/
>     AddHandler fastcgi-script .fcgi
>     FastCgiConfig -maxClassProcesses 10 -maxProcesses 40 -killInterval 100 -idle-timeout 120 -pass-header HTTP_AUTHORIZATION -autoUpdate
> </IfModule>
> 

What sort of measures can I take to prevent things like this? I can work on having the processes watched by an external monitoring program, but am curious as to how I can better optimize FastCGI to prevent this from happening.


For an example...when I looked at top, I saw this:

>  21:02:31  up 1 day, 13:57,  7 users,  load average: 326.86, 323.58, 318.40
> 1027400k used,    5380k free,       0k shrd,    3988k buff
>        346252k active,             599152k inactive
> Swap: 1052248k av, 1052248k used,       0k free                   35628k cached
> 
>   PID USER     PRI  NI  SIZE  RSS SHARE STAT %CPU %MEM   TIME CPU COMMAND
> 10478 root      16   0  8472 1612  1584 S    11.7  0.1  25:31   0 httpd
>     5 root      18   0     0    0     0 RW   11.3  0.0  14:33   0 kswapd
> 10610 apache    16   0  112M 107M  1492 D     6.0 10.6   6:34   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 10604 apache    15   0  194M 178M  1500 S     4.8 17.7  31:28   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 22702 apache    15   0 51796  39M  1516 S     2.7  3.9   5:58   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 19409 spamd     16   0 31100  20M  4744 D     2.0  1.9   2:48   0 spamd
> 10662 matchboy  17   0  6588 6372  5024 D     0.9  0.6   2:30   0 postmaster
> 10691 matchboy  15   0  6176 5924  4660 S     0.7  0.5   3:04   0 postmaster
> 10033 matchboy  15   0  1816 1788   704 R     0.6  0.1  18:18   0 top
>  8521 mailman   16   0  4580 2216  1196 D     0.6  0.2   0:56   0 python
>  4221 apache    21   0 17968 6620  1456 R     0.6  0.6   0:43   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 15773 spamd     19   0 26836 3276  1648 R     0.6  0.3   1:01   0 spamd
> 20980 rails1    19   0 18676  14M  1444 R     0.6  1.3   0:42   0 dispatch.fcgi
>  8522 mailman   16   0  4388 1972  1116 D     0.5  0.1   1:03   0 python
> 28368 rails1    24   0 17244 6232  1400 R     0.5  0.6   0:51   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 28376 rails1    24   0 18452 6208  1444 R     0.5  0.6   0:51   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 28407 rails1    20   0 17220 6304  1396 R     0.5  0.6   0:46   0 dispatch.fcgi
>  7169 rails1    21   0 17264 6880  1432 R     0.5  0.6   0:53   0 dispatch.fcgi
>  7430 apache    19   0 18180  12M  1444 R     0.5  1.2   0:43   0 dispatch.fcgi
>  7476 apache    20   0 19724  13M  1444 R     0.5  1.3   0:36   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 20984 apache    18   0 16896  11M  1400 R     0.5  1.1   0:43   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 11316 spamd     20   0 24204 2940  2212 R     0.5  0.2   0:20   0 spamd
>   789 root      15   0   572  552   488 R     0.4  0.0   7:52   0 syslogd
>  8516 mailman   16   0  4736 2228  1148 D     0.4  0.2   0:33   0 python
> 22712 curthibb  16   0  6120 5900  4512 D     0.4  0.5   0:42   0 postmaster
>  7191 rails1    19   0 17140 2040  1384 R     0.4  0.1   0:53   0 dispatch.fcgi
>  7489 apache    24   0 18468  13M  1448 R     0.4  1.2   0:42   0 dispatch.fcgi
>  7502 apache    24   0 18084  14M  1444 R     0.4  1.4   0:45   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 20968 rails1    21   0 17820  12M  1428 R     0.4  1.2   0:42   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 21001 apache    18   0 16964  10M  1440 D     0.4  1.0   0:42   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 10321 seventy2  18   0  4004 3836  3040 D     0.4  0.3   0:24   0 postmaster
> 10891 nobhillb  18   0  4148 3864  2680 R     0.4  0.3   0:11   0 java
> 10934 nobhillb  19   0  4132 3896  2668 R     0.4  0.3   0:12   0 java
> 11001 root      24   0  4356 3712   296 R     0.4  0.3   0:12   0 pidof
>  1009 mysql     16   0 31324 4252  1768 S     0.3  0.4  64:09   0 mysqld-max
>  8517 mailman   16   0  4352 2256  1120 D     0.3  0.2   0:28   0 python
> 19498 vpopmail  16   0  1528 1432   656 D     0.3  0.1   0:34   0 imapd
> 29921 rails1    17   0 18488 6788  1464 S     0.3  0.6   0:50   0 dispatch.fcgi
>   739 rails1    21   0 17164 5276  1392 R     0.3  0.5   0:49   0 dispatch.fcgi
>  7445 apache    18   0 17096  11M  1400 R     0.3  1.1   0:34   0 dispatch.fcgi
> 21161 seventy2  19   0  3148 2864  2260 R     0.3  0.2   0:30   0 postmaster
> 10539 root      21   0  4892 4480  1404 R     0.3  0.4   0:13   0 mrtg
> 10796 root      18   0  4912 2884  1404 R     0.3  0.2   0:09   0 mrtg
> 10935 johnbenz  18   0  2232 2016  1624 R     0.3  0.1   0:15   0 postmaster


Thanks,

Robby

-- 
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