PHP timeout while executing xmlsitemap.pages.inc

You didn't say it, but I guess you get that error when you are watching the sitemap content.

How many nodes do you have in your site? Take in consideration that branch 6.x-1 is not actually thought for sites with a high number of nodes, or user profiles (in the case you activated xmlsitemap_user.module too).

Since PHP let us set timeput at runtime , [ http://php.net/manual/en/function.set-time-limit.php ]
I'd love to have that at the top of the

function _xmlsitemap_output($chunk = NULL) 

xmlsitemap.module:336, with a proper setting in the admin/settings/xmlsitemap page

Example:

/**
 * Menu callback; display the site map.
 * @param $chunk:
 * An integer specifying which chunk of the site map is being requested. If
 * not set and there is more than one chunk, display the site map index.
 * @return None
 */
function _xmlsitemap_output($chunk = NULL) {
  set_time_limit ( XMLSITEMAP_MY_TIMEOUT ) ;
  drupal_set_header('Content-type: text/xml; charset=utf-8');
  .....etc etc

This solution helped with a very large website

Added an attempt to increase the time limit on file transfer to 240 seconds.
http://drupalcode.org/project/xmlsitemap.git/commit/195b668
http://drupalcode.org/project/xmlsitemap.git/commit/ddcba78

There's a problem with hardcoding the limit to 240. I have 40k+ nodes on my site and I'm trying to generate the xmlsitemap via drush....but it's failing after 240 seconds.

With this code, http://drupalcode.org/project/xmlsitemap.git/commitdiff/195b668?hp=fc45a... you need to check to see if max execution time is set lower than 240 seconds, then increase it. Not decrease it, if it's already larger.

This becomes very difficult to debug, as php, drush and now xmlsitemap all attempt to tweak this setting.

Here's an example of how to properly set this from some drush code

  $max_execution_time = ini_get('max_execution_time'); 
  if ($max_execution_time > 0 && $max_execution_time < 240) {
    set_time_limit(240); 
  }

We encountered the same problem as j0rd. The fix in #7 actually makes things worse when using drush.

Drush follows PHP cli (command line) defaults, which is max_execution_time = 0 (unlimited). So, another way to avoid messing up drush timeouts would be to check just if PHP cli is being used for example with:

 $max_execution_time = ini_get('max_execution_time'); 
  if (php_sapi_name() == 'cli' && $max_execution_time > 0 && $max_execution_time < 240) {
    set_time_limit(240); 

IMO: this hardcoded 240-value should be settable in the admin UI, or at least via $conf in settings.php.

I would encourage you to help out with reviewing core issue #2233929: drupal_set_time_limit should not be able to change the time limit if it's already unlimited