How to set fs.inotify.max_user_watches permanently for the VM

[ghost]

Hi!

I am running into some issues with Jest and hot reloading not working because the limit is set to 8192, and that looks to be very low.

I can go manually, ssh into the VM and change that value, but when I restart Rancher Desktop that value gets reset to 8192.

If I cat /proc/sys/fs/inotify/max_user_watches I get 524288, but I still need to run sudo sysctl -p to "load" it.

Is there a way of having this value to be permanent?

[jandubois]

If you are on macOS or Linux, take a look at #713 (comment)

[hendricksond]

Is there a new way to do this? In rancher desktop 1.13.1 on macos, this doesn't appear to be working:

In rdctl shell:

$ sysctl fs.inotify
fs.inotify.max_queued_events = 16384
fs.inotify.max_user_instances = 128
fs.inotify.max_user_watches = 61842

MacOS:

% cat ~/Library/Application\ Support/rancher-desktop/lima/_config/override.yaml 
provision:
- mode: system
  script: |
    #!/bin/sh
    cat <<'EOF' > /etc/security/limits.d/rancher-desktop.conf
    * soft     nofile         524288
    * hard     nofile         524288
    EOF

Not sure if it matters, but I am using the dockerd (moby) container engine.

[AndrewGrossman]

+1 to @hendricksond's question. I'm encountering this as well and the suggested fix does not appear to be working any longer.

[StingRayZA]

This worked for me (rancher-desktop 1.15.1)
@AndrewGrossman @hendricksond

provision:
- mode: system
  script: |
    #!/bin/sh
    echo "fs.inotify.max_user_watches=1048576" > /etc/sysctl.d/fs.inotify.conf
    sysctl -p /etc/sysctl.d/fs.inotify.conf

[AndrewGrossman]

@StingRayZA's solution appears to work for me.

[MikeSpreitzer]

Since the override is applied on every startup of the VM, I have success with the simpler approach of just making the adjustment directly.

mspreitz@mjs13 ~ % cat ~/Library/Application\ Support/rancher-desktop/lima/_config/override.yaml 
provision:
- mode: system
  script: |
    #!/bin/sh
    sysctl fs.inotify.max_user_watches=524288
    sysctl fs.inotify.max_user_instances=512

[GetCurious]

is there a solution for window? my VM restarts every night 😒
the config persist but everyday i need to run sudo sysctl -p

[StingRayZA]

You could try this: https://docs.rancherdesktop.io/how-to-guides/increasing-open-file-limit/#windows-steps or this: https://docs.rancherdesktop.io/how-to-guides/provisioning-scripts/#windows

I'm not on windows, so can't speak for it, so YMMV