unable to change open file limit in Ubuntu 11.10?

[Peter Higdon]

I am using stand alone REST server on ubuntu 11.10
I'm trying to follow along with: http://docs.neo4j.org/chunked/1.7/configuration-linux-notes.html

1. Edit /etc/security/limits.conf and add these two lines:
neo4j soft nofile 40000
neo4j hard nofile 40000

2. Edit /etc/pam.d/su and uncomment or add the following line:
session required pam_limits.so

There is no neo4j user in /etc/passwd.., so I'm using "*" instead of "neo4j"
It works for my login
 me@comp:~$ ulimit -n
40000

but when I run the server, I get error:

WARNING: Detected a limit of 1024 for maximum open files, while a minimum value of 40000 is recommended.

What happened to user "neo4j"? What user/permissions need to be changed to make this warning go away?

Thanks a lot!
Peter

[Peter Higdon]

oops. it's neo4j database kernel 1.7

[Nigel Small]

Hi Peter

The settings that work for me are almost the same as the ones published. Instead of:

neo4j   soft    nofile  40000 neo4j   hard    nofile  40000

I use: root   soft    nofile  40000 root   hard    nofile  40000 Unless you've explicitly created a neo4j user to run as, it'll almost certainly be running as root for you too. Nige

[Peter Higdon]

got it.
Thanks, Nige!