Performance Issues When Generating PDFs in FME

Can you give us some numbers? How many PDF’s, how much time is spent? Is it a particulary complex template that you’re using?

If it is a complex template and you’re processing a lot of PDF’s it may cause performance issues because the template is duplicated for each feature. Have you considered running them one at a time with a WorkspaceRunner?

​@redgeographics 

Thank you for your reply.

There are 5,000 PDFs.

I did my best to export one PDF per minute, but that means exporting 5,000 PDFs would take around 3 days.

The template consists of tables and some other attributes that I have to fill in using FME.

Regarding Workspace Runner, I used it to provide FME with an ID for each PDF export.

However, they want to export all PDFs at once, not export them individually by ID.

How could I fix the performance issue?
Do you have any tips or ideas I could try to improve the performance?

I am using FME 2021, and I also have FME Server.

Thanks

Without seeing the workspace or the results I can only give you general tips and advice.

So first of all: sometimes it just is what it is ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

That may not sound very helpful, but if it’s a fairly complex PDF and big workspace, 1 minute does not sound completely out of the ordinary.

Having said that, there’s some things you can consider:

1. If you have FME Server and can use multiple engines there, split the work across those engines. You’ll get your result faster.
2. If you are able to (i.e. if you have valid maintenance), upgrade FME to the latest version and upgrade the transformers in your workspace, as well as the readers and writers. This is not guaranteed to give you a performance boost, but given the fact you’re currently on a version that’s getting close to 5 years old, my bet is that it will make a difference.
3. Throw better hardware at it. Take a look at your current machine’s specs and if you have a chance of running it on better hardware, do it. If you’re reading from or writing to a network drive, try and change that to a local hard drive, SSD if possible. Lots of ram and a fast processor can make a difference too.
4. It’ll be an investment, but if it works… consider using one of the top-end Flow Hosted virtual machines. I’ve done that once for a big job that I wasn’t able to do on my own hardware

Regarding your comment “they want to export all PDFs at once”, I think in the end, the end result (i.e. 5000 PDFs) is what counts, not how you got there.

Hope this helps.