Transaction Log is a must have feature in Lotus Domino. If configured correctly, it’s almost speed up the whole Lotus Domino process. You can read more about Lotus Domino Transaction Log in here.
Transaction log need the fastest disk available, and also support failover. So, at least you need to have a dedicated raid 1 configured hard disk for transaction log files.
So, I follow the steps, using 2 x 15 k RPM SCSI hard disk and configure it as raid 1, and dedicated only for transaction log.
But, I still fell that the configuration is not fast enough, and I can’t get the faster hard disk, something is wrong.
After carefully studied, I found that to improve the hard disk performance of transaction log you need to use the non standard allocation unit size. The standard allocation unit size is 4092 bytes, don’t use it, manually change it to 32 kilobytes or even 64 kilobytes.
If somehow you already format the transaction log hard disk using the standard allocation unit size, to improve the transaction log performance, you need to re-format it with the new allocation unit size. There is third party software where you can change the allocation unit size without re-format, but you can do it with your own risk.
- Shut down the Lotus Domino server
- Backup all the transaction log files in ( no need special backup, just copy it into another disk).
- Format the disk, but do not use the standard allocation unit size (normally 4092 bytes), but change it into 32 kilobytes or 64 kilobytes. Do not use the quick format, use the slow format (just be safe)
- Restore the transaction log files.
- Start the Lotus Domino server
Now, your transaction log will work faster.
Last, do it in your own risk. It works in my Lotus Domino environment:
- Windows server 2003 x64,
- Lotus Domino 8.5.2 FP2 x64
And full backup will never hurt.
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How to Safely Delete Lotus Domino Transaction Log File
Transaction Log is a must have feature in Lotus Domino. If configured correctly, it’s almost speed up the whole Lotus Domino process. You can read more about Lotus Domino Transaction Log in here.
If you enable the feature, and you should, than you need to have a proper backup system that support the transaction log. Without the proper backup system that support transaction log, the disk will filled up by the transaction log files. The backup system will backup the transaction log files and then delete them, thus will free up space in your hard disk.
But, what happen if the backup system somehow not backup thing properly? What happen if the backup system do not backup the transaction log files and do not delete them? What should we do?
Recently, I had the same problem. Somehow my backup software did not delete the transaction log file after backup. My raid 1 transaction log disk was almost full, and need to free up some space quickly, before it crashed.
The first rule is you should not delete the transaction log manually, it will crashed the Lotus Domino server, believe me, I tried.
This is the workaround.
You can disable the transaction log, restart the server, enable the transaction log again, and then restart the server again. The minus point is, after you re-enable the transaction log, the Lotus Domino will do some database fixup on all of your databases in the server, it may take hours or even days.
Or you can,
- Change the transaction log from archival style to circular style
- Restart the server. It will safely delete the old transaction log files, and than it will create around 4 GB of transaction log files.
- Change it again to archival style
- Restart again, it will delete the transaction log and than again re-create the transaction log files again.
With this method, you can safe the time for database fixup.
Last, always do it in your own risk. It works in my Lotus Domino environment:
- Windows server 2003 x64,
- Lotus Domino 8.5.2 FP2 x64
And full backup will never hurt. 
Popularity: 1% [?]
About Lotus Domino Transaction Log
One of the feature of Lotus Domino that I can’t live without (as Lotus Domino administrator) is Transaction Log. Transaction Log help me a lot when the server crash (very rarely) and backup time.
Without the transaction log, when the server crash, it will take hours for the server to recovery. It will check every databases one at a time and try to check and fix if it found any problem. And when the database if being fix, the user can’t access it. If the database is big, more than 10 GB, it will take hours to complete it.
With transaction log, after the server crash, the server will ready in less than 15 minutes.
Without the transaction log, the backup procedure will become a problem. In my case the total databases size is more that 1 TB, and it will take almost 24 hours to complete the full backup. And it’s almost impossible to me to run full backup everyday.
With the transaction log, I only to run the full backup every week, and I only need to backup the transaction log for daily backup. Yes the full backup will take up to 24 hours for 1 TB data, for for daily backup, it take less than 1 hour backup.
So, if you have a medium size or large lotus domino server, I highly recommend that you to run it with transaction log enable.
Before that, these are a few tips.
- Use the fastest and dedicated hard drive that you can use for transaction log. I’m using IBM SAS drive with 15000 RPM, and that still too slow to me.
- Use raid 1 for transaction log, it recommended by IBM. So if one drive is failed, you still have one to run the transaction log.
- Backup, backup, backup. Transaction log rely on good backup that support transaction log, it will only clear up the old TXN files after the backup is complete. Without a good backup, your hard drive will filled up by the TXN files.
- If possible, use the latest Lotus Domino version. I have problem with Lotus Domino 8.5.2 FP1 that crash because the size of the transaction log, even the hard disk still have many free space. After consult with IBM support, they suggested me to upgrade the fixed pacth to FP2, after that the problem is gone.
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