Commit | Line | Data |
---|---|---|
ebac4655 JA |
1 | fio |
2 | --- | |
3 | ||
79809113 JA |
4 | fio is a tool that will spawn a number of threads or processes doing a |
5 | particular type of io action as specified by the user. fio takes a | |
6 | number of global parameters, each inherited by the thread unless | |
7 | otherwise parameters given to them overriding that setting is given. | |
8 | The typical use of fio is to write a job file matching the io load | |
9 | one wants to simulate. | |
ebac4655 | 10 | |
2b02b546 JA |
11 | |
12 | Source | |
13 | ------ | |
14 | ||
15 | fio resides in a git repo, the canonical place is: | |
16 | ||
4649b352 | 17 | git://git.kernel.dk/fio.git |
97f049c9 | 18 | |
4649b352 GG |
19 | When inside a corporate firewall, git:// URL sometimes does not work. |
20 | If git:// does not work, use the http protocol instead: | |
a9bac3f9 | 21 | |
4649b352 | 22 | http://git.kernel.dk/fio.git |
2b02b546 | 23 | |
4649b352 GG |
24 | Snapshots are frequently generated and include the git meta data as well. |
25 | Snapshots can download from: | |
2b02b546 | 26 | |
4649b352 | 27 | http://brick.kernel.dk/snaps/ |
2b02b546 | 28 | |
01fa84d5 JA |
29 | There are also two official mirrors. Both of these are synced within |
30 | an hour of commits landing at git.kernel.dk. So if the main repo is | |
31 | down for some reason, either one of those is safe to use: | |
32 | ||
33 | git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/axboe/fio.git | |
34 | https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/axboe/fio.git | |
35 | ||
36 | or | |
37 | ||
38 | https://github.com/axboe/fio.git | |
39 | ||
1053a106 | 40 | |
d85b1add SK |
41 | Binary packages |
42 | --------------- | |
43 | ||
44 | Debian: | |
45 | Starting with Debian "Squeeze", fio packages are part of the official | |
46 | Debian repository. http://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=fio | |
47 | ||
48 | Ubuntu: | |
49 | Starting with Ubuntu 10.04 LTS (aka "Lucid Lynx"), fio packages are part | |
50 | of the Ubuntu "universe" repository. | |
51 | http://packages.ubuntu.com/search?keywords=fio | |
52 | ||
d85b1add | 53 | Red Hat, CentOS & Co: |
a68594cb | 54 | Dag Wieërs has RPMs for Red Hat related distros, find them here: |
a68594cb JA |
55 | http://dag.wieers.com/rpm/packages/fio/ |
56 | ||
d85b1add | 57 | Mandriva: |
244e170e JA |
58 | Mandriva has integrated fio into their package repository, so installing |
59 | on that distro should be as easy as typing 'urpmi fio'. | |
60 | ||
d85b1add SK |
61 | Solaris: |
62 | Packages for Solaris are available from OpenCSW. Install their pkgutil | |
63 | tool (http://www.opencsw.org/get-it/pkgutil/) and then install fio via | |
64 | 'pkgutil -i fio'. | |
65 | ||
ecc314ba BC |
66 | Windows: |
67 | Bruce Cran <bruce@cran.org.uk> has fio packages for Windows at | |
78080867 | 68 | http://www.bluestop.org/fio/ . |
ecc314ba | 69 | |
2b02b546 | 70 | |
726f6ff0 JA |
71 | Mailing list |
72 | ------------ | |
73 | ||
4649b352 GG |
74 | The fio project mailing list is meant for anything related to fio including |
75 | general discussion, bug reporting, questions, and development. | |
2e8552b0 | 76 | |
4649b352 GG |
77 | An automated mail detailing recent commits is automatically sent to the |
78 | list at most daily. The list address is fio@vger.kernel.org, subscribe | |
79 | by sending an email to majordomo@vger.kernel.org with | |
80 | ||
81 | subscribe fio | |
2e8552b0 | 82 | |
4f5d1526 EIB |
83 | in the body of the email. Archives can be found here: |
84 | ||
4649b352 | 85 | http://www.spinics.net/lists/fio/ |
4f5d1526 EIB |
86 | |
87 | and archives for the old list can be found here: | |
2e8552b0 | 88 | |
4649b352 | 89 | http://maillist.kernel.dk/fio-devel/ |
726f6ff0 JA |
90 | |
91 | ||
bbfd6b00 JA |
92 | Building |
93 | -------- | |
94 | ||
6e1e384e | 95 | Just type 'configure', 'make' and 'make install'. |
bbfd6b00 | 96 | |
d015e398 BC |
97 | Note that GNU make is required. On BSD it's available from devel/gmake; |
98 | on Solaris it's in the SUNWgmake package. On platforms where GNU make | |
99 | isn't the default, type 'gmake' instead of 'make'. | |
bbfd6b00 | 100 | |
6e1e384e | 101 | Configure will print the enabled options. Note that on Linux based |
4649b352 GG |
102 | platforms, the libaio development packages must be installed to use |
103 | the libaio engine. Depending on distro, it is usually called | |
104 | libaio-devel or libaio-dev. | |
6de43c1b | 105 | |
4649b352 GG |
106 | For gfio, gtk 2.18 (or newer), associated glib threads, and cairo are required |
107 | to be installed. gfio isn't built automatically and can be enabled | |
6e1e384e | 108 | with a --enable-gfio option to configure. |
6de43c1b | 109 | |
2382dca7 AC |
110 | To build FIO with a cross-compiler: |
111 | $ make clean | |
112 | $ make CROSS_COMPILE=/path/to/toolchain/prefix | |
113 | Configure will attempt to determine the target platform automatically. | |
114 | ||
c8931876 JA |
115 | It's possible to build fio for ESX as well, use the --esx switch to |
116 | configure. | |
117 | ||
bbfd6b00 | 118 | |
53adf64f BC |
119 | Windows |
120 | ------- | |
121 | ||
9aa5fe32 BC |
122 | On Windows, Cygwin (http://www.cygwin.com/) is required in order to |
123 | build fio. To create an MSI installer package install WiX 3.8 from | |
f41862f7 | 124 | http://wixtoolset.org and run dobuild.cmd from the |
93bcfd20 | 125 | os/windows directory. |
53adf64f | 126 | |
9aa5fe32 | 127 | How to compile fio on 64-bit Windows: |
f41862f7 | 128 | |
9aa5fe32 | 129 | 1. Install Cygwin (http://www.cygwin.com/). Install 'make' and all |
f41862f7 | 130 | packages starting with 'mingw64-i686' and 'mingw64-x86_64'. |
9aa5fe32 BC |
131 | 2. Open the Cygwin Terminal. |
132 | 3. Go to the fio directory (source files). | |
133 | 4. Run 'make clean && make -j'. | |
134 | ||
135 | To build fio on 32-bit Windows, run './configure --build-32bit-win' before 'make'. | |
7409711b | 136 | |
78080867 BC |
137 | It's recommended that once built or installed, fio be run in a Command Prompt |
138 | or other 'native' console such as console2, since there are known to be display | |
139 | and signal issues when running it under a Cygwin shell | |
140 | (see http://code.google.com/p/mintty/issues/detail?id=56 for details). | |
141 | ||
53adf64f | 142 | |
972cfd25 JA |
143 | Command line |
144 | ------------ | |
ebac4655 JA |
145 | |
146 | $ fio | |
1cfd036f | 147 | --debug Enable some debugging options (see below) |
111e032d | 148 | --parse-only Parse options only, don't start any IO |
1cfd036f | 149 | --output Write output to file |
b2cecdc2 | 150 | --runtime Runtime in seconds |
bebe6398 | 151 | --bandwidth-log Generate per-job bandwidth logs |
1cfd036f | 152 | --minimal Minimal (terse) output |
f3afa57e | 153 | --output-format=type Output format (terse,json,normal) |
3449ab8c | 154 | --terse-version=type Terse version output format (default 3, or 2 or 4). |
f3afa57e | 155 | --version Print version info and exit |
1cfd036f | 156 | --help Print this page |
23893646 | 157 | --cpuclock-test Perform test/validation of CPU clock |
005f702b | 158 | --crctest[=test] Test speed of checksum functions |
bebe6398 | 159 | --cmdhelp=cmd Print command help, "all" for all of them |
de890a1e SL |
160 | --enghelp=engine Print ioengine help, or list available ioengines |
161 | --enghelp=engine,cmd Print help for an ioengine cmd | |
1cfd036f | 162 | --showcmd Turn a job file into command line options |
ad0a2735 | 163 | --readonly Turn on safety read-only checks, preventing |
bebe6398 | 164 | writes |
1cfd036f | 165 | --eta=when When ETA estimate should be printed |
bebe6398 | 166 | May be "always", "never" or "auto" |
e382e661 | 167 | --eta-newline=time Force a new line for every 'time' period passed |
06464907 | 168 | --status-interval=t Force full status dump every 't' period passed |
bebe6398 JA |
169 | --section=name Only run specified section in job file. |
170 | Multiple sections can be specified. | |
e7cb819b | 171 | --alloc-size=kb Set smalloc pool to this size in kb (def 1024) |
172 | --warnings-fatal Fio parser warnings are fatal | |
fca70358 | 173 | --max-jobs Maximum number of threads/processes to support |
bebe6398 JA |
174 | --server=args Start backend server. See Client/Server section. |
175 | --client=host Connect to specified backend. | |
323255cc | 176 | --remote-config=file Tell fio server to load this local file |
f2a2ce0e HL |
177 | --idle-prof=option Report cpu idleness on a system or percpu basis |
178 | (option=system,percpu) or run unit work | |
179 | calibration only (option=calibrate). | |
b26317c9 | 180 | --inflate-log=log Inflate and output compressed log |
e592a06b | 181 | |
b4692828 JA |
182 | |
183 | Any parameters following the options will be assumed to be job files, | |
4649b352 GG |
184 | unless they match a job file parameter. Multiple job files can be listed |
185 | and each job file will be regarded as a separate group. fio will stonewall | |
186 | execution between each group. | |
972cfd25 | 187 | |
4649b352 GG |
188 | The --readonly option is an extra safety guard to prevent users from |
189 | accidentally starting a write workload when that is not desired. Fio | |
190 | will only write if rw=write/randwrite/rw/randrw is given. This extra | |
191 | safety net can be used as an extra precaution as --readonly will also | |
192 | enable a write check in the io engine core to prevent writes due to | |
193 | unknown user space bug(s). | |
724e4435 | 194 | |
4649b352 GG |
195 | The --debug option triggers additional logging by fio. |
196 | Currently, additional logging is available for: | |
ee56ad50 JA |
197 | |
198 | process Dump info related to processes | |
199 | file Dump info related to file actions | |
e7cb819b | 200 | io Dump info related to IO queuing |
201 | mem Dump info related to memory allocations | |
bd6f78b2 JA |
202 | blktrace Dump info related to blktrace setup |
203 | verify Dump info related to IO verification | |
e7cb819b | 204 | all Enable all debug options |
811a0d06 | 205 | random Dump info related to random offset generation |
a3d741fa | 206 | parse Dump info related to option matching and parsing |
cd991b9e | 207 | diskutil Dump info related to disk utilization updates |
5e1d306e | 208 | job:x Dump info only related to job number x |
29adda3c | 209 | mutex Dump info only related to mutex up/down ops |
c223da83 JA |
210 | profile Dump info related to profile extensions |
211 | time Dump info related to internal time keeping | |
3e260a46 JA |
212 | net Dump info related to networking connections |
213 | rate Dump info related to IO rate switching | |
0c56718d | 214 | compress Dump info related to log compress/decompress |
bd6f78b2 | 215 | ? or help Show available debug options. |
ee56ad50 | 216 | |
4649b352 | 217 | One can specify multiple debug options: e.g. --debug=file,mem will enable |
bd6f78b2 | 218 | file and memory debugging. |
ee56ad50 | 219 | |
4649b352 GG |
220 | The --section option allows one to combine related jobs into one file. |
221 | E.g. one job file could define light, moderate, and heavy sections. Tell fio to | |
222 | run only the "heavy" section by giving --section=heavy command line option. | |
223 | One can also specify the "write" operations in one section and "verify" | |
224 | operation in another section. The --section option only applies to job | |
225 | sections. The reserved 'global' section is always parsed and used. | |
226 | ||
227 | The --alloc-size switch allows one to use a larger pool size for smalloc. | |
228 | If running large jobs with randommap enabled, fio can run out of memory. | |
229 | Smalloc is an internal allocator for shared structures from a fixed size | |
230 | memory pool. The pool size defaults to 1024k and can grow to 128 pools. | |
01f06b63 | 231 | |
4649b352 | 232 | NOTE: While running .fio_smalloc.* backing store files are visible in /tmp. |
2b386d25 | 233 | |
79809113 JA |
234 | |
235 | Job file | |
236 | -------- | |
237 | ||
4649b352 GG |
238 | See the HOWTO file for a complete description of job file syntax and |
239 | parameters. The --cmdhelp option also lists all options. If used with | |
240 | an option argument, --cmdhelp will detail the given option. The job file | |
241 | format is in the ini style format, as that is easy for the user to review | |
242 | and modify. | |
79809113 | 243 | |
4649b352 GG |
244 | This README contains the terse version. Job files can describe big and |
245 | complex setups that are not possible with the command line. Job files | |
246 | are a good practice even for simple jobs since the file provides an | |
247 | easily accessed record of the workload and can include comments. | |
248 | ||
249 | See the examples/ directory for inspiration on how to write job files. Note | |
250 | the copyright and license requirements currently apply to examples/ files. | |
79809113 | 251 | |
217bc04b | 252 | |
bebe6398 JA |
253 | Client/server |
254 | ------------ | |
255 | ||
4649b352 GG |
256 | Normally fio is invoked as a stand-alone application on the machine |
257 | where the IO workload should be generated. However, the frontend and | |
258 | backend of fio can be run separately. Ie the fio server can generate | |
259 | an IO workload on the "Device Under Test" while being controlled from | |
260 | another machine. | |
bebe6398 | 261 | |
4649b352 | 262 | Start the server on the machine which has access to the storage DUT: |
bebe6398 JA |
263 | |
264 | fio --server=args | |
265 | ||
4649b352 GG |
266 | where args defines what fio listens to. The arguments are of the form |
267 | 'type,hostname or IP,port'. 'type' is either 'ip' (or ip4) for TCP/IP v4, | |
268 | 'ip6' for TCP/IP v6, or 'sock' for a local unix domain socket. | |
811826be JA |
269 | 'hostname' is either a hostname or IP address, and 'port' is the port to |
270 | listen to (only valid for TCP/IP, not a local socket). Some examples: | |
bebe6398 JA |
271 | |
272 | 1) fio --server | |
273 | ||
274 | Start a fio server, listening on all interfaces on the default port (8765). | |
275 | ||
811826be | 276 | 2) fio --server=ip:hostname,4444 |
bebe6398 JA |
277 | |
278 | Start a fio server, listening on IP belonging to hostname and on port 4444. | |
279 | ||
811826be JA |
280 | 3) fio --server=ip6:::1,4444 |
281 | ||
282 | Start a fio server, listening on IPv6 localhost ::1 and on port 4444. | |
283 | ||
284 | 4) fio --server=,4444 | |
bebe6398 JA |
285 | |
286 | Start a fio server, listening on all interfaces on port 4444. | |
287 | ||
811826be | 288 | 5) fio --server=1.2.3.4 |
bebe6398 JA |
289 | |
290 | Start a fio server, listening on IP 1.2.3.4 on the default port. | |
291 | ||
811826be | 292 | 6) fio --server=sock:/tmp/fio.sock |
bebe6398 JA |
293 | |
294 | Start a fio server, listening on the local socket /tmp/fio.sock. | |
295 | ||
4649b352 | 296 | Once a server is running, a "client" can connect to the fio server with: |
bebe6398 | 297 | |
4649b352 | 298 | fio --local-args --client=<server> --remote-args <job file(s)> |
bebe6398 | 299 | |
4649b352 | 300 | where --local-args are arguments for the client where it is |
bebe6398 JA |
301 | running, 'server' is the connect string, and --remote-args and <job file(s)> |
302 | are sent to the server. The 'server' string follows the same format as it | |
303 | does on the server side, to allow IP/hostname/socket and port strings. | |
bebe6398 | 304 | |
4649b352 GG |
305 | Fio can connect to multiple servers this way: |
306 | ||
307 | fio --client=<server1> <job file(s)> --client=<server2> <job file(s)> | |
bebe6398 | 308 | |
323255cc JA |
309 | If the job file is located on the fio server, then you can tell the server |
310 | to load a local file as well. This is done by using --remote-config: | |
311 | ||
312 | fio --client=server --remote-config /path/to/file.fio | |
313 | ||
7b41a78a | 314 | Then the fio server will open this local (to the server) job file instead |
323255cc JA |
315 | of being passed one from the client. |
316 | ||
bebe6398 | 317 | |
217bc04b JA |
318 | Platforms |
319 | --------- | |
320 | ||
1b8c5af7 JA |
321 | Fio works on (at least) Linux, Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, OSX, NetBSD, OpenBSD, |
322 | Windows and FreeBSD. Some features and/or options may only be available on | |
323 | some of the platforms, typically because those features only apply to that | |
324 | platform (like the solarisaio engine, or the splice engine on Linux). | |
217bc04b JA |
325 | |
326 | Some features are not available on FreeBSD/Solaris even if they could be | |
327 | implemented, I'd be happy to take patches for that. An example of that is | |
328 | disk utility statistics and (I think) huge page support, support for that | |
329 | does exist in FreeBSD/Solaris. | |
330 | ||
331 | Fio uses pthread mutexes for signalling and locking and FreeBSD does not | |
332 | support process shared pthread mutexes. As a result, only threads are | |
333 | supported on FreeBSD. This could be fixed with sysv ipc locking or | |
334 | other locking alternatives. | |
335 | ||
336 | Other *BSD platforms are untested, but fio should work there almost out | |
337 | of the box. Since I don't do test runs or even compiles on those platforms, | |
338 | your mileage may vary. Sending me patches for other platforms is greatly | |
339 | appreciated. There's a lot of value in having the same test/benchmark tool | |
340 | available on all platforms. | |
341 | ||
4649b352 | 342 | Note that POSIX aio is not enabled by default on AIX. Messages like these: |
bf2e821a CC |
343 | |
344 | Symbol resolution failed for /usr/lib/libc.a(posix_aio.o) because: | |
345 | Symbol _posix_kaio_rdwr (number 2) is not exported from dependent module /unix. | |
346 | ||
4649b352 | 347 | indicate one needs to enable POSIX aio. Run the following commands as root: |
bf2e821a CC |
348 | |
349 | # lsdev -C -l posix_aio0 | |
350 | posix_aio0 Defined Posix Asynchronous I/O | |
351 | # cfgmgr -l posix_aio0 | |
352 | # lsdev -C -l posix_aio0 | |
353 | posix_aio0 Available Posix Asynchronous I/O | |
354 | ||
355 | POSIX aio should work now. To make the change permanent: | |
356 | ||
357 | # chdev -l posix_aio0 -P -a autoconfig='available' | |
358 | posix_aio0 changed | |
217bc04b JA |
359 | |
360 | ||
79809113 JA |
361 | Author |
362 | ------ | |
363 | ||
aae22ca7 | 364 | Fio was written by Jens Axboe <axboe@kernel.dk> to enable flexible testing |
79809113 JA |
365 | of the Linux IO subsystem and schedulers. He got tired of writing |
366 | specific test applications to simulate a given workload, and found that | |
367 | the existing io benchmark/test tools out there weren't flexible enough | |
368 | to do what he wanted. | |
369 | ||
aae22ca7 | 370 | Jens Axboe <axboe@kernel.dk> 20060905 |
79809113 | 371 |