>I am having trouble finding the meaning of "opens: xxx" when I issue a
>"status" command at MySQL command line. It does not seem to be the
>same thing as Variable_Names "Open_files", or "Open_tables", etc, as I
>am not getting the same values.

There is a difference between "I have opened XXX tables since the
server restarted" and "I have YYY tables open right now". Similarly,
there's a difference between "my server has answered 2.7 million
questions since it was last restarted" (about 1 a second for a
month) vs. "my server is processing 2.7 million questions right
now" (which is ridiculous).

>I have a J2EE app that is slowing down after a day or so, after I
>moved it from MySQL 3.23.5x to 5.0.45. I noticed when the problem
>happens I see a parameter of [or as high as] opens:549 from my status
>command. If I shutdown/start MySQL, the problem goes away, and opens:
>parameter starts off again in the single digits....but starts
>gradually growing again.

I would expect the number of opens to never decrease except when
you restart the server. The same goes for the number of questions.

As the server stays up longer, it tends to get bigger, either because
it is fully utilizing the memory it is supposed to use (various
caches fill up, etc) or because it is leaking memory. If MySQL and
J2EE is running on the same server, perhaps they are fighting over
available memory. Or perhaps the total memory to be used by MySQL
is just too much for the available memory on the server (so tune
the parameters lower, or get more memory). The number of opens may
roughly correspond to server uptime.

>Does this mean I have 549 live open connections via my connector/j
>driver from my app?

No, 549 connections since startup. This is not inconsistent with a
maximum of 10 simultaneous connections.

>I haven't changed my app at all.....and I suppose
>I need to find out what "opens:xxx" means, but am not finding it. All
>docs that I Google or Dubois' MySQL book refer to all the other
>"Open_xxxx" parameters.