Chuck Swiger wrote:

>> So is there no chance this is hardware related? Because somehow I'm 
>> really looking into that corner.
> 
> No, there is no chance this is hardware related.  You're running Apache, 
> MySQL, random Perl scripts, and apparently trying to compile or do other 
> stuff, on a machine that simply doesn't have enough RAM or swapspace to 
> handle so many tasks at once....

I stopped and restarted the httpd process. After stopping it released 
almost all swap (17M still in use), after I started the process again it 
took no swap (so currently swap usage still sits at 17M).

Tomorrow I'll put more memory in the box and hope things will get 
better. Just one last question before I call it a day: is it normal to 
have httpd processes with so many open filedescriptors to /var and /usr 
(/usr is where my http documents live)?

Thank you for your help,
Vincent van Scherpenseel