Add small tool to check for dedupable contents in a file/device
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1.TH fio 1 "October 2013" "User Manual"
2.SH NAME
3fio \- flexible I/O tester
4.SH SYNOPSIS
5.B fio
6[\fIoptions\fR] [\fIjobfile\fR]...
7.SH DESCRIPTION
8.B fio
9is a tool that will spawn a number of threads or processes doing a
10particular type of I/O action as specified by the user.
11The typical use of fio is to write a job file matching the I/O load
12one wants to simulate.
13.SH OPTIONS
14.TP
15.BI \-\-debug \fR=\fPtype
16Enable verbose tracing of various fio actions. May be `all' for all types
17or individual types separated by a comma (eg \-\-debug=io,file). `help' will
18list all available tracing options.
19.TP
20.BI \-\-output \fR=\fPfilename
21Write output to \fIfilename\fR.
22.TP
23.BI \-\-runtime \fR=\fPruntime
24Limit run time to \fIruntime\fR seconds.
25.TP
26.B \-\-latency\-log
27Generate per-job latency logs.
28.TP
29.B \-\-bandwidth\-log
30Generate per-job bandwidth logs.
31.TP
32.B \-\-minimal
33Print statistics in a terse, semicolon-delimited format.
34.TP
35.B \-\-append-terse
36Print statistics in selected mode AND terse, semicolon-delimited format.
37.TP
38.B \-\-version
39Display version information and exit.
40.TP
41.BI \-\-terse\-version \fR=\fPversion
42Set terse version output format (Current version 3, or older version 2).
43.TP
44.B \-\-help
45Display usage information and exit.
46.TP
47.B \-\-cpuclock-test
48Perform test and validation of internal CPU clock
49.TP
50.BI \-\-crctest[\fR=\fPtest]
51Test the speed of the builtin checksumming functions. If no argument is given,
52all of them are tested. Or a comma separated list can be passed, in which
53case the given ones are tested.
54.TP
55.BI \-\-cmdhelp \fR=\fPcommand
56Print help information for \fIcommand\fR. May be `all' for all commands.
57.TP
58.BI \-\-enghelp \fR=\fPioengine[,command]
59List all commands defined by \fIioengine\fR, or print help for \fIcommand\fR defined by \fIioengine\fR.
60.TP
61.BI \-\-showcmd \fR=\fPjobfile
62Convert \fIjobfile\fR to a set of command-line options.
63.TP
64.BI \-\-eta \fR=\fPwhen
65Specifies when real-time ETA estimate should be printed. \fIwhen\fR may
66be one of `always', `never' or `auto'.
67.TP
68.BI \-\-eta\-newline \fR=\fPtime
69Force an ETA newline for every `time` period passed.
70.TP
71.BI \-\-status\-interval \fR=\fPtime
72Report full output status every `time` period passed.
73.TP
74.BI \-\-readonly
75Turn on safety read-only checks, preventing any attempted write.
76.TP
77.BI \-\-section \fR=\fPsec
78Only run section \fIsec\fR from job file. This option can be used multiple times to add more sections to run.
79.TP
80.BI \-\-alloc\-size \fR=\fPkb
81Set the internal smalloc pool size to \fIkb\fP kilobytes.
82.TP
83.BI \-\-warnings\-fatal
84All fio parser warnings are fatal, causing fio to exit with an error.
85.TP
86.BI \-\-max\-jobs \fR=\fPnr
87Set the maximum allowed number of jobs (threads/processes) to support.
88.TP
89.BI \-\-server \fR=\fPargs
90Start a backend server, with \fIargs\fP specifying what to listen to. See client/server section.
91.TP
92.BI \-\-daemonize \fR=\fPpidfile
93Background a fio server, writing the pid to the given pid file.
94.TP
95.BI \-\-client \fR=\fPhost
96Instead of running the jobs locally, send and run them on the given host.
97.TP
98.BI \-\-idle\-prof \fR=\fPoption
99Report cpu idleness on a system or percpu basis (\fIoption\fP=system,percpu) or run unit work calibration only (\fIoption\fP=calibrate).
100.SH "JOB FILE FORMAT"
101Job files are in `ini' format. They consist of one or more
102job definitions, which begin with a job name in square brackets and
103extend to the next job name. The job name can be any ASCII string
104except `global', which has a special meaning. Following the job name is
105a sequence of zero or more parameters, one per line, that define the
106behavior of the job. Any line starting with a `;' or `#' character is
107considered a comment and ignored.
108.P
109If \fIjobfile\fR is specified as `-', the job file will be read from
110standard input.
111.SS "Global Section"
112The global section contains default parameters for jobs specified in the
113job file. A job is only affected by global sections residing above it,
114and there may be any number of global sections. Specific job definitions
115may override any parameter set in global sections.
116.SH "JOB PARAMETERS"
117.SS Types
118Some parameters may take arguments of a specific type. The types used are:
119.TP
120.I str
121String: a sequence of alphanumeric characters.
122.TP
123.I int
124SI integer: a whole number, possibly containing a suffix denoting the base unit
125of the value. Accepted suffixes are `k', 'M', 'G', 'T', and 'P', denoting
126kilo (1024), mega (1024^2), giga (1024^3), tera (1024^4), and peta (1024^5)
127respectively. If prefixed with '0x', the value is assumed to be base 16
128(hexadecimal). A suffix may include a trailing 'b', for instance 'kb' is
129identical to 'k'. You can specify a base 10 value by using 'KiB', 'MiB','GiB',
130etc. This is useful for disk drives where values are often given in base 10
131values. Specifying '30GiB' will get you 30*1000^3 bytes.
132When specifying times the default suffix meaning changes, still denoting the
133base unit of the value, but accepted suffixes are 'D' (days), 'H' (hours), 'M'
134(minutes), 'S' Seconds, 'ms' (or msec) milli seconds, 'us' (or 'usec') micro
135seconds. Time values without a unit specify seconds.
136The suffixes are not case sensitive.
137.TP
138.I bool
139Boolean: a true or false value. `0' denotes false, `1' denotes true.
140.TP
141.I irange
142Integer range: a range of integers specified in the format
143\fIlower\fR:\fIupper\fR or \fIlower\fR\-\fIupper\fR. \fIlower\fR and
144\fIupper\fR may contain a suffix as described above. If an option allows two
145sets of ranges, they are separated with a `,' or `/' character. For example:
146`8\-8k/8M\-4G'.
147.TP
148.I float_list
149List of floating numbers: A list of floating numbers, separated by
150a ':' character.
151.SS "Parameter List"
152.TP
153.BI name \fR=\fPstr
154May be used to override the job name. On the command line, this parameter
155has the special purpose of signalling the start of a new job.
156.TP
157.BI description \fR=\fPstr
158Human-readable description of the job. It is printed when the job is run, but
159otherwise has no special purpose.
160.TP
161.BI directory \fR=\fPstr
162Prefix filenames with this directory. Used to place files in a location other
163than `./'.
164You can specify a number of directories by separating the names with a ':'
165character. These directories will be assigned equally distributed to job clones
166creates with \fInumjobs\fR as long as they are using generated filenames.
167If specific \fIfilename(s)\fR are set fio will use the first listed directory,
168and thereby matching the \fIfilename\fR semantic which generates a file each
169clone if not specified, but let all clones use the same if set. See
170\fIfilename\fR for considerations regarding escaping certain characters on
171some platforms.
172.TP
173.BI filename \fR=\fPstr
174.B fio
175normally makes up a file name based on the job name, thread number, and file
176number. If you want to share files between threads in a job or several jobs,
177specify a \fIfilename\fR for each of them to override the default.
178If the I/O engine is file-based, you can specify
179a number of files by separating the names with a `:' character. `\-' is a
180reserved name, meaning stdin or stdout, depending on the read/write direction
181set. On Windows, disk devices are accessed as \\.\PhysicalDrive0 for the first
182device, \\.\PhysicalDrive1 for the second etc. Note: Windows and FreeBSD
183prevent write access to areas of the disk containing in-use data
184(e.g. filesystems). If the wanted filename does need to include a colon, then
185escape that with a '\\' character. For instance, if the filename is
186"/dev/dsk/foo@3,0:c", then you would use filename="/dev/dsk/foo@3,0\\:c".
187.TP
188.BI filename_format \fR=\fPstr
189If sharing multiple files between jobs, it is usually necessary to have
190fio generate the exact names that you want. By default, fio will name a file
191based on the default file format specification of
192\fBjobname.jobnumber.filenumber\fP. With this option, that can be
193customized. Fio will recognize and replace the following keywords in this
194string:
195.RS
196.RS
197.TP
198.B $jobname
199The name of the worker thread or process.
200.TP
201.B $jobnum
202The incremental number of the worker thread or process.
203.TP
204.B $filenum
205The incremental number of the file for that worker thread or process.
206.RE
207.P
208To have dependent jobs share a set of files, this option can be set to
209have fio generate filenames that are shared between the two. For instance,
210if \fBtestfiles.$filenum\fR is specified, file number 4 for any job will
211be named \fBtestfiles.4\fR. The default of \fB$jobname.$jobnum.$filenum\fR
212will be used if no other format specifier is given.
213.RE
214.P
215.TP
216.BI lockfile \fR=\fPstr
217Fio defaults to not locking any files before it does IO to them. If a file or
218file descriptor is shared, fio can serialize IO to that file to make the end
219result consistent. This is usual for emulating real workloads that share files.
220The lock modes are:
221.RS
222.RS
223.TP
224.B none
225No locking. This is the default.
226.TP
227.B exclusive
228Only one thread or process may do IO at a time, excluding all others.
229.TP
230.B readwrite
231Read-write locking on the file. Many readers may access the file at the same
232time, but writes get exclusive access.
233.RE
234.RE
235.P
236.BI opendir \fR=\fPstr
237Recursively open any files below directory \fIstr\fR.
238.TP
239.BI readwrite \fR=\fPstr "\fR,\fP rw" \fR=\fPstr
240Type of I/O pattern. Accepted values are:
241.RS
242.RS
243.TP
244.B read
245Sequential reads.
246.TP
247.B write
248Sequential writes.
249.TP
250.B trim
251Sequential trim (Linux block devices only).
252.TP
253.B randread
254Random reads.
255.TP
256.B randwrite
257Random writes.
258.TP
259.B randtrim
260Random trim (Linux block devices only).
261.TP
262.B rw, readwrite
263Mixed sequential reads and writes.
264.TP
265.B randrw
266Mixed random reads and writes.
267.RE
268.P
269For mixed I/O, the default split is 50/50. For certain types of io the result
270may still be skewed a bit, since the speed may be different. It is possible to
271specify a number of IO's to do before getting a new offset, this is done by
272appending a `:\fI<nr>\fR to the end of the string given. For a random read, it
273would look like \fBrw=randread:8\fR for passing in an offset modifier with a
274value of 8. If the postfix is used with a sequential IO pattern, then the value
275specified will be added to the generated offset for each IO. For instance,
276using \fBrw=write:4k\fR will skip 4k for every write. It turns sequential IO
277into sequential IO with holes. See the \fBrw_sequencer\fR option.
278.RE
279.TP
280.BI rw_sequencer \fR=\fPstr
281If an offset modifier is given by appending a number to the \fBrw=<str>\fR line,
282then this option controls how that number modifies the IO offset being
283generated. Accepted values are:
284.RS
285.RS
286.TP
287.B sequential
288Generate sequential offset
289.TP
290.B identical
291Generate the same offset
292.RE
293.P
294\fBsequential\fR is only useful for random IO, where fio would normally
295generate a new random offset for every IO. If you append eg 8 to randread, you
296would get a new random offset for every 8 IO's. The result would be a seek for
297only every 8 IO's, instead of for every IO. Use \fBrw=randread:8\fR to specify
298that. As sequential IO is already sequential, setting \fBsequential\fR for that
299would not result in any differences. \fBidentical\fR behaves in a similar
300fashion, except it sends the same offset 8 number of times before generating a
301new offset.
302.RE
303.P
304.TP
305.BI kb_base \fR=\fPint
306The base unit for a kilobyte. The defacto base is 2^10, 1024. Storage
307manufacturers like to use 10^3 or 1000 as a base ten unit instead, for obvious
308reasons. Allowed values are 1024 or 1000, with 1024 being the default.
309.TP
310.BI unified_rw_reporting \fR=\fPbool
311Fio normally reports statistics on a per data direction basis, meaning that
312read, write, and trim are accounted and reported separately. If this option is
313set fio sums the results and reports them as "mixed" instead.
314.TP
315.BI randrepeat \fR=\fPbool
316Seed the random number generator used for random I/O patterns in a predictable
317way so the pattern is repeatable across runs. Default: true.
318.TP
319.BI allrandrepeat \fR=\fPbool
320Seed all random number generators in a predictable way so results are
321repeatable across runs. Default: false.
322.TP
323.BI randseed \fR=\fPint
324Seed the random number generators based on this seed value, to be able to
325control what sequence of output is being generated. If not set, the random
326sequence depends on the \fBrandrepeat\fR setting.
327.TP
328.BI use_os_rand \fR=\fPbool
329Fio can either use the random generator supplied by the OS to generate random
330offsets, or it can use its own internal generator (based on Tausworthe).
331Default is to use the internal generator, which is often of better quality and
332faster. Default: false.
333.TP
334.BI fallocate \fR=\fPstr
335Whether pre-allocation is performed when laying down files. Accepted values
336are:
337.RS
338.RS
339.TP
340.B none
341Do not pre-allocate space.
342.TP
343.B posix
344Pre-allocate via \fBposix_fallocate\fR\|(3).
345.TP
346.B keep
347Pre-allocate via \fBfallocate\fR\|(2) with FALLOC_FL_KEEP_SIZE set.
348.TP
349.B 0
350Backward-compatible alias for 'none'.
351.TP
352.B 1
353Backward-compatible alias for 'posix'.
354.RE
355.P
356May not be available on all supported platforms. 'keep' is only
357available on Linux. If using ZFS on Solaris this must be set to 'none'
358because ZFS doesn't support it. Default: 'posix'.
359.RE
360.TP
361.BI fadvise_hint \fR=\fPbool
362Use \fBposix_fadvise\fR\|(2) to advise the kernel what I/O patterns
363are likely to be issued. Default: true.
364.TP
365.BI size \fR=\fPint
366Total size of I/O for this job. \fBfio\fR will run until this many bytes have
367been transferred, unless limited by other options (\fBruntime\fR, for instance).
368Unless \fBnrfiles\fR and \fBfilesize\fR options are given, this amount will be
369divided between the available files for the job. If not set, fio will use the
370full size of the given files or devices. If the files do not exist, size
371must be given. It is also possible to give size as a percentage between 1 and
372100. If size=20% is given, fio will use 20% of the full size of the given
373files or devices.
374.TP
375.BI io_limit \fR=\fPint
376Normally fio operates within the region set by \fBsize\fR, which means that
377the \fBsize\fR option sets both the region and size of IO to be performed.
378Sometimes that is not what you want. With this option, it is possible to
379define just the amount of IO that fio should do. For instance, if \fBsize\fR
380is set to 20G and \fBio_limit\fR is set to 5G, fio will perform IO within
381the first 20G but exit when 5G have been done.
382.TP
383.BI fill_device \fR=\fPbool "\fR,\fB fill_fs" \fR=\fPbool
384Sets size to something really large and waits for ENOSPC (no space left on
385device) as the terminating condition. Only makes sense with sequential write.
386For a read workload, the mount point will be filled first then IO started on
387the result. This option doesn't make sense if operating on a raw device node,
388since the size of that is already known by the file system. Additionally,
389writing beyond end-of-device will not return ENOSPC there.
390.TP
391.BI filesize \fR=\fPirange
392Individual file sizes. May be a range, in which case \fBfio\fR will select sizes
393for files at random within the given range, limited to \fBsize\fR in total (if
394that is given). If \fBfilesize\fR is not specified, each created file is the
395same size.
396.TP
397.BI file_append \fR=\fPbool
398Perform IO after the end of the file. Normally fio will operate within the
399size of a file. If this option is set, then fio will append to the file
400instead. This has identical behavior to setting \fRoffset\fP to the size
401of a file. This option is ignored on non-regular files.
402.TP
403.BI blocksize \fR=\fPint[,int] "\fR,\fB bs" \fR=\fPint[,int]
404Block size for I/O units. Default: 4k. Values for reads, writes, and trims
405can be specified separately in the format \fIread\fR,\fIwrite\fR,\fItrim\fR
406either of which may be empty to leave that value at its default. If a trailing
407comma isn't given, the remainder will inherit the last value set.
408.TP
409.BI blocksize_range \fR=\fPirange[,irange] "\fR,\fB bsrange" \fR=\fPirange[,irange]
410Specify a range of I/O block sizes. The issued I/O unit will always be a
411multiple of the minimum size, unless \fBblocksize_unaligned\fR is set. Applies
412to both reads and writes if only one range is given, but can be specified
413separately with a comma separating the values. Example: bsrange=1k-4k,2k-8k.
414Also (see \fBblocksize\fR).
415.TP
416.BI bssplit \fR=\fPstr
417This option allows even finer grained control of the block sizes issued,
418not just even splits between them. With this option, you can weight various
419block sizes for exact control of the issued IO for a job that has mixed
420block sizes. The format of the option is bssplit=blocksize/percentage,
421optionally adding as many definitions as needed separated by a colon.
422Example: bssplit=4k/10:64k/50:32k/40 would issue 50% 64k blocks, 10% 4k
423blocks and 40% 32k blocks. \fBbssplit\fR also supports giving separate
424splits to reads and writes. The format is identical to what the
425\fBbs\fR option accepts, the read and write parts are separated with a
426comma.
427.TP
428.B blocksize_unaligned\fR,\fP bs_unaligned
429If set, any size in \fBblocksize_range\fR may be used. This typically won't
430work with direct I/O, as that normally requires sector alignment.
431.TP
432.BI blockalign \fR=\fPint[,int] "\fR,\fB ba" \fR=\fPint[,int]
433At what boundary to align random IO offsets. Defaults to the same as 'blocksize'
434the minimum blocksize given. Minimum alignment is typically 512b
435for using direct IO, though it usually depends on the hardware block size.
436This option is mutually exclusive with using a random map for files, so it
437will turn off that option.
438.TP
439.BI bs_is_seq_rand \fR=\fPbool
440If this option is set, fio will use the normal read,write blocksize settings as
441sequential,random instead. Any random read or write will use the WRITE
442blocksize settings, and any sequential read or write will use the READ
443blocksize setting.
444.TP
445.B zero_buffers
446Initialize buffers with all zeros. Default: fill buffers with random data.
447The resulting IO buffers will not be completely zeroed, unless
448\fPscramble_buffers\fR is also turned off.
449.TP
450.B refill_buffers
451If this option is given, fio will refill the IO buffers on every submit. The
452default is to only fill it at init time and reuse that data. Only makes sense
453if zero_buffers isn't specified, naturally. If data verification is enabled,
454refill_buffers is also automatically enabled.
455.TP
456.BI scramble_buffers \fR=\fPbool
457If \fBrefill_buffers\fR is too costly and the target is using data
458deduplication, then setting this option will slightly modify the IO buffer
459contents to defeat normal de-dupe attempts. This is not enough to defeat
460more clever block compression attempts, but it will stop naive dedupe
461of blocks. Default: true.
462.TP
463.BI buffer_compress_percentage \fR=\fPint
464If this is set, then fio will attempt to provide IO buffer content (on WRITEs)
465that compress to the specified level. Fio does this by providing a mix of
466random data and zeroes. Note that this is per block size unit, for file/disk
467wide compression level that matches this setting, you'll also want to set
468\fBrefill_buffers\fR.
469.TP
470.BI buffer_compress_chunk \fR=\fPint
471See \fBbuffer_compress_percentage\fR. This setting allows fio to manage how
472big the ranges of random data and zeroed data is. Without this set, fio will
473provide \fBbuffer_compress_percentage\fR of blocksize random data, followed by
474the remaining zeroed. With this set to some chunk size smaller than the block
475size, fio can alternate random and zeroed data throughout the IO buffer.
476.TP
477.BI buffer_pattern \fR=\fPstr
478If set, fio will fill the IO buffers with this pattern. If not set, the contents
479of IO buffers is defined by the other options related to buffer contents. The
480setting can be any pattern of bytes, and can be prefixed with 0x for hex
481values. It may also be a string, where the string must then be wrapped with
482"".
483.TP
484.BI dedupe_percentage \fR=\fPint
485If set, fio will generate this percentage of identical buffers when writing.
486These buffers will be naturally dedupable. The contents of the buffers depend
487on what other buffer compression settings have been set. It's possible to have
488the individual buffers either fully compressible, or not at all. This option
489only controls the distribution of unique buffers.
490.TP
491.BI nrfiles \fR=\fPint
492Number of files to use for this job. Default: 1.
493.TP
494.BI openfiles \fR=\fPint
495Number of files to keep open at the same time. Default: \fBnrfiles\fR.
496.TP
497.BI file_service_type \fR=\fPstr
498Defines how files to service are selected. The following types are defined:
499.RS
500.RS
501.TP
502.B random
503Choose a file at random.
504.TP
505.B roundrobin
506Round robin over opened files (default).
507.TP
508.B sequential
509Do each file in the set sequentially.
510.RE
511.P
512The number of I/Os to issue before switching to a new file can be specified by
513appending `:\fIint\fR' to the service type.
514.RE
515.TP
516.BI ioengine \fR=\fPstr
517Defines how the job issues I/O. The following types are defined:
518.RS
519.RS
520.TP
521.B sync
522Basic \fBread\fR\|(2) or \fBwrite\fR\|(2) I/O. \fBfseek\fR\|(2) is used to
523position the I/O location.
524.TP
525.B psync
526Basic \fBpread\fR\|(2) or \fBpwrite\fR\|(2) I/O.
527.TP
528.B vsync
529Basic \fBreadv\fR\|(2) or \fBwritev\fR\|(2) I/O. Will emulate queuing by
530coalescing adjacent IOs into a single submission.
531.TP
532.B pvsync
533Basic \fBpreadv\fR\|(2) or \fBpwritev\fR\|(2) I/O.
534.TP
535.B libaio
536Linux native asynchronous I/O. This ioengine defines engine specific options.
537.TP
538.B posixaio
539POSIX asynchronous I/O using \fBaio_read\fR\|(3) and \fBaio_write\fR\|(3).
540.TP
541.B solarisaio
542Solaris native asynchronous I/O.
543.TP
544.B windowsaio
545Windows native asynchronous I/O.
546.TP
547.B mmap
548File is memory mapped with \fBmmap\fR\|(2) and data copied using
549\fBmemcpy\fR\|(3).
550.TP
551.B splice
552\fBsplice\fR\|(2) is used to transfer the data and \fBvmsplice\fR\|(2) to
553transfer data from user-space to the kernel.
554.TP
555.B syslet-rw
556Use the syslet system calls to make regular read/write asynchronous.
557.TP
558.B sg
559SCSI generic sg v3 I/O. May be either synchronous using the SG_IO ioctl, or if
560the target is an sg character device, we use \fBread\fR\|(2) and
561\fBwrite\fR\|(2) for asynchronous I/O.
562.TP
563.B null
564Doesn't transfer any data, just pretends to. Mainly used to exercise \fBfio\fR
565itself and for debugging and testing purposes.
566.TP
567.B net
568Transfer over the network. The protocol to be used can be defined with the
569\fBprotocol\fR parameter. Depending on the protocol, \fBfilename\fR,
570\fBhostname\fR, \fBport\fR, or \fBlisten\fR must be specified.
571This ioengine defines engine specific options.
572.TP
573.B netsplice
574Like \fBnet\fR, but uses \fBsplice\fR\|(2) and \fBvmsplice\fR\|(2) to map data
575and send/receive. This ioengine defines engine specific options.
576.TP
577.B cpuio
578Doesn't transfer any data, but burns CPU cycles according to \fBcpuload\fR and
579\fBcpucycles\fR parameters.
580.TP
581.B guasi
582The GUASI I/O engine is the Generic Userspace Asynchronous Syscall Interface
583approach to asynchronous I/O.
584.br
585See <http://www.xmailserver.org/guasi\-lib.html>.
586.TP
587.B rdma
588The RDMA I/O engine supports both RDMA memory semantics (RDMA_WRITE/RDMA_READ)
589and channel semantics (Send/Recv) for the InfiniBand, RoCE and iWARP protocols.
590.TP
591.B external
592Loads an external I/O engine object file. Append the engine filename as
593`:\fIenginepath\fR'.
594.TP
595.B falloc
596 IO engine that does regular linux native fallocate call to simulate data
597transfer as fio ioengine
598.br
599 DDIR_READ does fallocate(,mode = FALLOC_FL_KEEP_SIZE,)
600.br
601 DIR_WRITE does fallocate(,mode = 0)
602.br
603 DDIR_TRIM does fallocate(,mode = FALLOC_FL_KEEP_SIZE|FALLOC_FL_PUNCH_HOLE)
604.TP
605.B e4defrag
606IO engine that does regular EXT4_IOC_MOVE_EXT ioctls to simulate defragment activity
607request to DDIR_WRITE event
608.TP
609.B rbd
610IO engine supporting direct access to Ceph Rados Block Devices (RBD) via librbd
611without the need to use the kernel rbd driver. This ioengine defines engine specific
612options.
613.TP
614.B gfapi
615Using Glusterfs libgfapi sync interface to direct access to Glusterfs volumes without
616having to go through FUSE. This ioengine defines engine specific
617options.
618.TP
619.B gfapi_async
620Using Glusterfs libgfapi async interface to direct access to Glusterfs volumes without
621having to go through FUSE. This ioengine defines engine specific
622options.
623.TP
624.B libhdfs
625Read and write through Hadoop (HDFS). The \fBfilename\fR option is used to
626specify host,port of the hdfs name-node to connect. This engine interprets
627offsets a little differently. In HDFS, files once created cannot be modified.
628So random writes are not possible. To imitate this, libhdfs engine expects
629bunch of small files to be created over HDFS, and engine will randomly pick a
630file out of those files based on the offset generated by fio backend. (see the
631example job file to create such files, use rw=write option). Please note, you
632might want to set necessary environment variables to work with hdfs/libhdfs
633properly.
634.RE
635.P
636.RE
637.TP
638.BI iodepth \fR=\fPint
639Number of I/O units to keep in flight against the file. Note that increasing
640iodepth beyond 1 will not affect synchronous ioengines (except for small
641degress when verify_async is in use). Even async engines may impose OS
642restrictions causing the desired depth not to be achieved. This may happen on
643Linux when using libaio and not setting \fBdirect\fR=1, since buffered IO is
644not async on that OS. Keep an eye on the IO depth distribution in the
645fio output to verify that the achieved depth is as expected. Default: 1.
646.TP
647.BI iodepth_batch \fR=\fPint
648Number of I/Os to submit at once. Default: \fBiodepth\fR.
649.TP
650.BI iodepth_batch_complete \fR=\fPint
651This defines how many pieces of IO to retrieve at once. It defaults to 1 which
652 means that we'll ask for a minimum of 1 IO in the retrieval process from the
653kernel. The IO retrieval will go on until we hit the limit set by
654\fBiodepth_low\fR. If this variable is set to 0, then fio will always check for
655completed events before queuing more IO. This helps reduce IO latency, at the
656cost of more retrieval system calls.
657.TP
658.BI iodepth_low \fR=\fPint
659Low watermark indicating when to start filling the queue again. Default:
660\fBiodepth\fR.
661.TP
662.BI direct \fR=\fPbool
663If true, use non-buffered I/O (usually O_DIRECT). Default: false.
664.TP
665.BI atomic \fR=\fPbool
666If value is true, attempt to use atomic direct IO. Atomic writes are guaranteed
667to be stable once acknowledged by the operating system. Only Linux supports
668O_ATOMIC right now.
669.TP
670.BI buffered \fR=\fPbool
671If true, use buffered I/O. This is the opposite of the \fBdirect\fR parameter.
672Default: true.
673.TP
674.BI offset \fR=\fPint
675Offset in the file to start I/O. Data before the offset will not be touched.
676.TP
677.BI offset_increment \fR=\fPint
678If this is provided, then the real offset becomes the
679offset + offset_increment * thread_number, where the thread number is a
680counter that starts at 0 and is incremented for each sub-job (i.e. when
681numjobs option is specified). This option is useful if there are several jobs
682which are intended to operate on a file in parallel disjoint segments, with
683even spacing between the starting points.
684.TP
685.BI number_ios \fR=\fPint
686Fio will normally perform IOs until it has exhausted the size of the region
687set by \fBsize\fR, or if it exhaust the allocated time (or hits an error
688condition). With this setting, the range/size can be set independently of
689the number of IOs to perform. When fio reaches this number, it will exit
690normally and report status.
691.TP
692.BI fsync \fR=\fPint
693How many I/Os to perform before issuing an \fBfsync\fR\|(2) of dirty data. If
6940, don't sync. Default: 0.
695.TP
696.BI fdatasync \fR=\fPint
697Like \fBfsync\fR, but uses \fBfdatasync\fR\|(2) instead to only sync the
698data parts of the file. Default: 0.
699.TP
700.BI write_barrier \fR=\fPint
701Make every Nth write a barrier write.
702.TP
703.BI sync_file_range \fR=\fPstr:int
704Use \fBsync_file_range\fR\|(2) for every \fRval\fP number of write operations. Fio will
705track range of writes that have happened since the last \fBsync_file_range\fR\|(2) call.
706\fRstr\fP can currently be one or more of:
707.RS
708.TP
709.B wait_before
710SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE
711.TP
712.B write
713SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE
714.TP
715.B wait_after
716SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE
717.TP
718.RE
719.P
720So if you do sync_file_range=wait_before,write:8, fio would use
721\fBSYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE | SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE\fP for every 8 writes.
722Also see the \fBsync_file_range\fR\|(2) man page. This option is Linux specific.
723.TP
724.BI overwrite \fR=\fPbool
725If writing, setup the file first and do overwrites. Default: false.
726.TP
727.BI end_fsync \fR=\fPbool
728Sync file contents when a write stage has completed. Default: false.
729.TP
730.BI fsync_on_close \fR=\fPbool
731If true, sync file contents on close. This differs from \fBend_fsync\fR in that
732it will happen on every close, not just at the end of the job. Default: false.
733.TP
734.BI rwmixread \fR=\fPint
735Percentage of a mixed workload that should be reads. Default: 50.
736.TP
737.BI rwmixwrite \fR=\fPint
738Percentage of a mixed workload that should be writes. If \fBrwmixread\fR and
739\fBrwmixwrite\fR are given and do not sum to 100%, the latter of the two
740overrides the first. This may interfere with a given rate setting, if fio is
741asked to limit reads or writes to a certain rate. If that is the case, then
742the distribution may be skewed. Default: 50.
743.TP
744.BI random_distribution \fR=\fPstr:float
745By default, fio will use a completely uniform random distribution when asked
746to perform random IO. Sometimes it is useful to skew the distribution in
747specific ways, ensuring that some parts of the data is more hot than others.
748Fio includes the following distribution models:
749.RS
750.TP
751.B random
752Uniform random distribution
753.TP
754.B zipf
755Zipf distribution
756.TP
757.B pareto
758Pareto distribution
759.TP
760.RE
761.P
762When using a zipf or pareto distribution, an input value is also needed to
763define the access pattern. For zipf, this is the zipf theta. For pareto,
764it's the pareto power. Fio includes a test program, genzipf, that can be
765used visualize what the given input values will yield in terms of hit rates.
766If you wanted to use zipf with a theta of 1.2, you would use
767random_distribution=zipf:1.2 as the option. If a non-uniform model is used,
768fio will disable use of the random map.
769.TP
770.BI percentage_random \fR=\fPint
771For a random workload, set how big a percentage should be random. This defaults
772to 100%, in which case the workload is fully random. It can be set from
773anywhere from 0 to 100. Setting it to 0 would make the workload fully
774sequential. It is possible to set different values for reads, writes, and
775trim. To do so, simply use a comma separated list. See \fBblocksize\fR.
776.TP
777.B norandommap
778Normally \fBfio\fR will cover every block of the file when doing random I/O. If
779this parameter is given, a new offset will be chosen without looking at past
780I/O history. This parameter is mutually exclusive with \fBverify\fR.
781.TP
782.BI softrandommap \fR=\fPbool
783See \fBnorandommap\fR. If fio runs with the random block map enabled and it
784fails to allocate the map, if this option is set it will continue without a
785random block map. As coverage will not be as complete as with random maps, this
786option is disabled by default.
787.TP
788.BI random_generator \fR=\fPstr
789Fio supports the following engines for generating IO offsets for random IO:
790.RS
791.TP
792.B tausworthe
793Strong 2^88 cycle random number generator
794.TP
795.B lfsr
796Linear feedback shift register generator
797.TP
798.RE
799.P
800Tausworthe is a strong random number generator, but it requires tracking on the
801side if we want to ensure that blocks are only read or written once. LFSR
802guarantees that we never generate the same offset twice, and it's also less
803computationally expensive. It's not a true random generator, however, though
804for IO purposes it's typically good enough. LFSR only works with single block
805sizes, not with workloads that use multiple block sizes. If used with such a
806workload, fio may read or write some blocks multiple times.
807.TP
808.BI nice \fR=\fPint
809Run job with given nice value. See \fBnice\fR\|(2).
810.TP
811.BI prio \fR=\fPint
812Set I/O priority value of this job between 0 (highest) and 7 (lowest). See
813\fBionice\fR\|(1).
814.TP
815.BI prioclass \fR=\fPint
816Set I/O priority class. See \fBionice\fR\|(1).
817.TP
818.BI thinktime \fR=\fPint
819Stall job for given number of microseconds between issuing I/Os.
820.TP
821.BI thinktime_spin \fR=\fPint
822Pretend to spend CPU time for given number of microseconds, sleeping the rest
823of the time specified by \fBthinktime\fR. Only valid if \fBthinktime\fR is set.
824.TP
825.BI thinktime_blocks \fR=\fPint
826Only valid if thinktime is set - control how many blocks to issue, before
827waiting \fBthinktime\fR microseconds. If not set, defaults to 1 which will
828make fio wait \fBthinktime\fR microseconds after every block. This
829effectively makes any queue depth setting redundant, since no more than 1 IO
830will be queued before we have to complete it and do our thinktime. In other
831words, this setting effectively caps the queue depth if the latter is larger.
832Default: 1.
833.TP
834.BI rate \fR=\fPint
835Cap bandwidth used by this job. The number is in bytes/sec, the normal postfix
836rules apply. You can use \fBrate\fR=500k to limit reads and writes to 500k each,
837or you can specify read and writes separately. Using \fBrate\fR=1m,500k would
838limit reads to 1MB/sec and writes to 500KB/sec. Capping only reads or writes
839can be done with \fBrate\fR=,500k or \fBrate\fR=500k,. The former will only
840limit writes (to 500KB/sec), the latter will only limit reads.
841.TP
842.BI ratemin \fR=\fPint
843Tell \fBfio\fR to do whatever it can to maintain at least the given bandwidth.
844Failing to meet this requirement will cause the job to exit. The same format
845as \fBrate\fR is used for read vs write separation.
846.TP
847.BI rate_iops \fR=\fPint
848Cap the bandwidth to this number of IOPS. Basically the same as rate, just
849specified independently of bandwidth. The same format as \fBrate\fR is used for
850read vs write separation. If \fBblocksize\fR is a range, the smallest block
851size is used as the metric.
852.TP
853.BI rate_iops_min \fR=\fPint
854If this rate of I/O is not met, the job will exit. The same format as \fBrate\fR
855is used for read vs write separation.
856.TP
857.BI ratecycle \fR=\fPint
858Average bandwidth for \fBrate\fR and \fBratemin\fR over this number of
859milliseconds. Default: 1000ms.
860.TP
861.BI latency_target \fR=\fPint
862If set, fio will attempt to find the max performance point that the given
863workload will run at while maintaining a latency below this target. The
864values is given in microseconds. See \fBlatency_window\fR and
865\fBlatency_percentile\fR.
866.TP
867.BI latency_window \fR=\fPint
868Used with \fBlatency_target\fR to specify the sample window that the job
869is run at varying queue depths to test the performance. The value is given
870in microseconds.
871.TP
872.BI latency_percentile \fR=\fPfloat
873The percentage of IOs that must fall within the criteria specified by
874\fBlatency_target\fR and \fBlatency_window\fR. If not set, this defaults
875to 100.0, meaning that all IOs must be equal or below to the value set
876by \fBlatency_target\fR.
877.TP
878.BI max_latency \fR=\fPint
879If set, fio will exit the job if it exceeds this maximum latency. It will exit
880with an ETIME error.
881.TP
882.BI cpumask \fR=\fPint
883Set CPU affinity for this job. \fIint\fR is a bitmask of allowed CPUs the job
884may run on. See \fBsched_setaffinity\fR\|(2).
885.TP
886.BI cpus_allowed \fR=\fPstr
887Same as \fBcpumask\fR, but allows a comma-delimited list of CPU numbers.
888.TP
889.BI cpus_allowed_policy \fR=\fPstr
890Set the policy of how fio distributes the CPUs specified by \fBcpus_allowed\fR
891or \fBcpumask\fR. Two policies are supported:
892.RS
893.RS
894.TP
895.B shared
896All jobs will share the CPU set specified.
897.TP
898.B split
899Each job will get a unique CPU from the CPU set.
900.RE
901.P
902\fBshared\fR is the default behaviour, if the option isn't specified. If
903\fBsplit\fR is specified, then fio will assign one cpu per job. If not enough
904CPUs are given for the jobs listed, then fio will roundrobin the CPUs in
905the set.
906.RE
907.P
908.TP
909.BI numa_cpu_nodes \fR=\fPstr
910Set this job running on specified NUMA nodes' CPUs. The arguments allow
911comma delimited list of cpu numbers, A-B ranges, or 'all'.
912.TP
913.BI numa_mem_policy \fR=\fPstr
914Set this job's memory policy and corresponding NUMA nodes. Format of
915the arguments:
916.RS
917.TP
918.B <mode>[:<nodelist>]
919.TP
920.B mode
921is one of the following memory policy:
922.TP
923.B default, prefer, bind, interleave, local
924.TP
925.RE
926For \fBdefault\fR and \fBlocal\fR memory policy, no \fBnodelist\fR is
927needed to be specified. For \fBprefer\fR, only one node is
928allowed. For \fBbind\fR and \fBinterleave\fR, \fBnodelist\fR allows
929comma delimited list of numbers, A-B ranges, or 'all'.
930.TP
931.BI startdelay \fR=\fPirange
932Delay start of job for the specified number of seconds. Supports all time
933suffixes to allow specification of hours, minutes, seconds and
934milliseconds - seconds are the default if a unit is ommited.
935Can be given as a range which causes each thread to choose randomly out of the
936range.
937.TP
938.BI runtime \fR=\fPint
939Terminate processing after the specified number of seconds.
940.TP
941.B time_based
942If given, run for the specified \fBruntime\fR duration even if the files are
943completely read or written. The same workload will be repeated as many times
944as \fBruntime\fR allows.
945.TP
946.BI ramp_time \fR=\fPint
947If set, fio will run the specified workload for this amount of time before
948logging any performance numbers. Useful for letting performance settle before
949logging results, thus minimizing the runtime required for stable results. Note
950that the \fBramp_time\fR is considered lead in time for a job, thus it will
951increase the total runtime if a special timeout or runtime is specified.
952.TP
953.BI invalidate \fR=\fPbool
954Invalidate buffer-cache for the file prior to starting I/O. Default: true.
955.TP
956.BI sync \fR=\fPbool
957Use synchronous I/O for buffered writes. For the majority of I/O engines,
958this means using O_SYNC. Default: false.
959.TP
960.BI iomem \fR=\fPstr "\fR,\fP mem" \fR=\fPstr
961Allocation method for I/O unit buffer. Allowed values are:
962.RS
963.RS
964.TP
965.B malloc
966Allocate memory with \fBmalloc\fR\|(3).
967.TP
968.B shm
969Use shared memory buffers allocated through \fBshmget\fR\|(2).
970.TP
971.B shmhuge
972Same as \fBshm\fR, but use huge pages as backing.
973.TP
974.B mmap
975Use \fBmmap\fR\|(2) for allocation. Uses anonymous memory unless a filename
976is given after the option in the format `:\fIfile\fR'.
977.TP
978.B mmaphuge
979Same as \fBmmap\fR, but use huge files as backing.
980.RE
981.P
982The amount of memory allocated is the maximum allowed \fBblocksize\fR for the
983job multiplied by \fBiodepth\fR. For \fBshmhuge\fR or \fBmmaphuge\fR to work,
984the system must have free huge pages allocated. \fBmmaphuge\fR also needs to
985have hugetlbfs mounted, and \fIfile\fR must point there. At least on Linux,
986huge pages must be manually allocated. See \fB/proc/sys/vm/nr_hugehages\fR
987and the documentation for that. Normally you just need to echo an appropriate
988number, eg echoing 8 will ensure that the OS has 8 huge pages ready for
989use.
990.RE
991.TP
992.BI iomem_align \fR=\fPint "\fR,\fP mem_align" \fR=\fPint
993This indicates the memory alignment of the IO memory buffers. Note that the
994given alignment is applied to the first IO unit buffer, if using \fBiodepth\fR
995the alignment of the following buffers are given by the \fBbs\fR used. In
996other words, if using a \fBbs\fR that is a multiple of the page sized in the
997system, all buffers will be aligned to this value. If using a \fBbs\fR that
998is not page aligned, the alignment of subsequent IO memory buffers is the
999sum of the \fBiomem_align\fR and \fBbs\fR used.
1000.TP
1001.BI hugepage\-size \fR=\fPint
1002Defines the size of a huge page. Must be at least equal to the system setting.
1003Should be a multiple of 1MB. Default: 4MB.
1004.TP
1005.B exitall
1006Terminate all jobs when one finishes. Default: wait for each job to finish.
1007.TP
1008.BI bwavgtime \fR=\fPint
1009Average bandwidth calculations over the given time in milliseconds. Default:
1010500ms.
1011.TP
1012.BI iopsavgtime \fR=\fPint
1013Average IOPS calculations over the given time in milliseconds. Default:
1014500ms.
1015.TP
1016.BI create_serialize \fR=\fPbool
1017If true, serialize file creation for the jobs. Default: true.
1018.TP
1019.BI create_fsync \fR=\fPbool
1020\fBfsync\fR\|(2) data file after creation. Default: true.
1021.TP
1022.BI create_on_open \fR=\fPbool
1023If true, the files are not created until they are opened for IO by the job.
1024.TP
1025.BI create_only \fR=\fPbool
1026If true, fio will only run the setup phase of the job. If files need to be
1027laid out or updated on disk, only that will be done. The actual job contents
1028are not executed.
1029.TP
1030.BI pre_read \fR=\fPbool
1031If this is given, files will be pre-read into memory before starting the given
1032IO operation. This will also clear the \fR \fBinvalidate\fR flag, since it is
1033pointless to pre-read and then drop the cache. This will only work for IO
1034engines that are seekable, since they allow you to read the same data
1035multiple times. Thus it will not work on eg network or splice IO.
1036.TP
1037.BI unlink \fR=\fPbool
1038Unlink job files when done. Default: false.
1039.TP
1040.BI loops \fR=\fPint
1041Specifies the number of iterations (runs of the same workload) of this job.
1042Default: 1.
1043.TP
1044.BI verify_only \fR=\fPbool
1045Do not perform the specified workload, only verify data still matches previous
1046invocation of this workload. This option allows one to check data multiple
1047times at a later date without overwriting it. This option makes sense only for
1048workloads that write data, and does not support workloads with the
1049\fBtime_based\fR option set.
1050.TP
1051.BI do_verify \fR=\fPbool
1052Run the verify phase after a write phase. Only valid if \fBverify\fR is set.
1053Default: true.
1054.TP
1055.BI verify \fR=\fPstr
1056Method of verifying file contents after each iteration of the job. Allowed
1057values are:
1058.RS
1059.RS
1060.TP
1061.B md5 crc16 crc32 crc32c crc32c-intel crc64 crc7 sha256 sha512 sha1 xxhash
1062Store appropriate checksum in the header of each block. crc32c-intel is
1063hardware accelerated SSE4.2 driven, falls back to regular crc32c if
1064not supported by the system.
1065.TP
1066.B meta
1067Write extra information about each I/O (timestamp, block number, etc.). The
1068block number is verified. See \fBverify_pattern\fR as well.
1069.TP
1070.B null
1071Pretend to verify. Used for testing internals.
1072.RE
1073
1074This option can be used for repeated burn-in tests of a system to make sure
1075that the written data is also correctly read back. If the data direction given
1076is a read or random read, fio will assume that it should verify a previously
1077written file. If the data direction includes any form of write, the verify will
1078be of the newly written data.
1079.RE
1080.TP
1081.BI verifysort \fR=\fPbool
1082If true, written verify blocks are sorted if \fBfio\fR deems it to be faster to
1083read them back in a sorted manner. Default: true.
1084.TP
1085.BI verifysort_nr \fR=\fPint
1086Pre-load and sort verify blocks for a read workload.
1087.TP
1088.BI verify_offset \fR=\fPint
1089Swap the verification header with data somewhere else in the block before
1090writing. It is swapped back before verifying.
1091.TP
1092.BI verify_interval \fR=\fPint
1093Write the verification header for this number of bytes, which should divide
1094\fBblocksize\fR. Default: \fBblocksize\fR.
1095.TP
1096.BI verify_pattern \fR=\fPstr
1097If set, fio will fill the io buffers with this pattern. Fio defaults to filling
1098with totally random bytes, but sometimes it's interesting to fill with a known
1099pattern for io verification purposes. Depending on the width of the pattern,
1100fio will fill 1/2/3/4 bytes of the buffer at the time(it can be either a
1101decimal or a hex number). The verify_pattern if larger than a 32-bit quantity
1102has to be a hex number that starts with either "0x" or "0X". Use with
1103\fBverify\fP=meta.
1104.TP
1105.BI verify_fatal \fR=\fPbool
1106If true, exit the job on the first observed verification failure. Default:
1107false.
1108.TP
1109.BI verify_dump \fR=\fPbool
1110If set, dump the contents of both the original data block and the data block we
1111read off disk to files. This allows later analysis to inspect just what kind of
1112data corruption occurred. Off by default.
1113.TP
1114.BI verify_async \fR=\fPint
1115Fio will normally verify IO inline from the submitting thread. This option
1116takes an integer describing how many async offload threads to create for IO
1117verification instead, causing fio to offload the duty of verifying IO contents
1118to one or more separate threads. If using this offload option, even sync IO
1119engines can benefit from using an \fBiodepth\fR setting higher than 1, as it
1120allows them to have IO in flight while verifies are running.
1121.TP
1122.BI verify_async_cpus \fR=\fPstr
1123Tell fio to set the given CPU affinity on the async IO verification threads.
1124See \fBcpus_allowed\fP for the format used.
1125.TP
1126.BI verify_backlog \fR=\fPint
1127Fio will normally verify the written contents of a job that utilizes verify
1128once that job has completed. In other words, everything is written then
1129everything is read back and verified. You may want to verify continually
1130instead for a variety of reasons. Fio stores the meta data associated with an
1131IO block in memory, so for large verify workloads, quite a bit of memory would
1132be used up holding this meta data. If this option is enabled, fio will write
1133only N blocks before verifying these blocks.
1134.TP
1135.BI verify_backlog_batch \fR=\fPint
1136Control how many blocks fio will verify if verify_backlog is set. If not set,
1137will default to the value of \fBverify_backlog\fR (meaning the entire queue is
1138read back and verified). If \fBverify_backlog_batch\fR is less than
1139\fBverify_backlog\fR then not all blocks will be verified, if
1140\fBverify_backlog_batch\fR is larger than \fBverify_backlog\fR, some blocks
1141will be verified more than once.
1142.TP
1143.BI trim_percentage \fR=\fPint
1144Number of verify blocks to discard/trim.
1145.TP
1146.BI trim_verify_zero \fR=\fPbool
1147Verify that trim/discarded blocks are returned as zeroes.
1148.TP
1149.BI trim_backlog \fR=\fPint
1150Trim after this number of blocks are written.
1151.TP
1152.BI trim_backlog_batch \fR=\fPint
1153Trim this number of IO blocks.
1154.TP
1155.BI experimental_verify \fR=\fPbool
1156Enable experimental verification.
1157.TP
1158.B stonewall "\fR,\fP wait_for_previous"
1159Wait for preceding jobs in the job file to exit before starting this one.
1160\fBstonewall\fR implies \fBnew_group\fR.
1161.TP
1162.B new_group
1163Start a new reporting group. If not given, all jobs in a file will be part
1164of the same reporting group, unless separated by a stonewall.
1165.TP
1166.BI numjobs \fR=\fPint
1167Number of clones (processes/threads performing the same workload) of this job.
1168Default: 1.
1169.TP
1170.B group_reporting
1171If set, display per-group reports instead of per-job when \fBnumjobs\fR is
1172specified.
1173.TP
1174.B thread
1175Use threads created with \fBpthread_create\fR\|(3) instead of processes created
1176with \fBfork\fR\|(2).
1177.TP
1178.BI zonesize \fR=\fPint
1179Divide file into zones of the specified size in bytes. See \fBzoneskip\fR.
1180.TP
1181.BI zonerange \fR=\fPint
1182Give size of an IO zone. See \fBzoneskip\fR.
1183.TP
1184.BI zoneskip \fR=\fPint
1185Skip the specified number of bytes when \fBzonesize\fR bytes of data have been
1186read.
1187.TP
1188.BI write_iolog \fR=\fPstr
1189Write the issued I/O patterns to the specified file. Specify a separate file
1190for each job, otherwise the iologs will be interspersed and the file may be
1191corrupt.
1192.TP
1193.BI read_iolog \fR=\fPstr
1194Replay the I/O patterns contained in the specified file generated by
1195\fBwrite_iolog\fR, or may be a \fBblktrace\fR binary file.
1196.TP
1197.BI replay_no_stall \fR=\fPint
1198While replaying I/O patterns using \fBread_iolog\fR the default behavior
1199attempts to respect timing information between I/Os. Enabling
1200\fBreplay_no_stall\fR causes I/Os to be replayed as fast as possible while
1201still respecting ordering.
1202.TP
1203.BI replay_redirect \fR=\fPstr
1204While replaying I/O patterns using \fBread_iolog\fR the default behavior
1205is to replay the IOPS onto the major/minor device that each IOP was recorded
1206from. Setting \fBreplay_redirect\fR causes all IOPS to be replayed onto the
1207single specified device regardless of the device it was recorded from.
1208.TP
1209.BI write_bw_log \fR=\fPstr
1210If given, write a bandwidth log of the jobs in this job file. Can be used to
1211store data of the bandwidth of the jobs in their lifetime. The included
1212fio_generate_plots script uses gnuplot to turn these text files into nice
1213graphs. See \fBwrite_lat_log\fR for behaviour of given filename. For this
1214option, the postfix is _bw.x.log, where x is the index of the job (1..N,
1215where N is the number of jobs)
1216.TP
1217.BI write_lat_log \fR=\fPstr
1218Same as \fBwrite_bw_log\fR, but writes I/O completion latencies. If no
1219filename is given with this option, the default filename of
1220"jobname_type.x.log" is used, where x is the index of the job (1..N, where
1221N is the number of jobs). Even if the filename is given, fio will still
1222append the type of log.
1223.TP
1224.BI write_iops_log \fR=\fPstr
1225Same as \fBwrite_bw_log\fR, but writes IOPS. If no filename is given with this
1226option, the default filename of "jobname_type.x.log" is used, where x is the
1227index of the job (1..N, where N is the number of jobs). Even if the filename
1228is given, fio will still append the type of log.
1229.TP
1230.BI log_avg_msec \fR=\fPint
1231By default, fio will log an entry in the iops, latency, or bw log for every
1232IO that completes. When writing to the disk log, that can quickly grow to a
1233very large size. Setting this option makes fio average the each log entry
1234over the specified period of time, reducing the resolution of the log.
1235Defaults to 0.
1236.TP
1237.BI log_offset \fR=\fPbool
1238If this is set, the iolog options will include the byte offset for the IO
1239entry as well as the other data values.
1240.TP
1241.BI log_compression \fR=\fPint
1242If this is set, fio will compress the IO logs as it goes, to keep the memory
1243footprint lower. When a log reaches the specified size, that chunk is removed
1244and compressed in the background. Given that IO logs are fairly highly
1245compressible, this yields a nice memory savings for longer runs. The downside
1246is that the compression will consume some background CPU cycles, so it may
1247impact the run. This, however, is also true if the logging ends up consuming
1248most of the system memory. So pick your poison. The IO logs are saved
1249normally at the end of a run, by decompressing the chunks and storing them
1250in the specified log file. This feature depends on the availability of zlib.
1251.TP
1252.BI log_store_compressed \fR=\fPbool
1253If set, and \fBlog\fR_compression is also set, fio will store the log files in
1254a compressed format. They can be decompressed with fio, using the
1255\fB\-\-inflate-log\fR command line parameter. The files will be stored with a
1256\fB\.fz\fR suffix.
1257.TP
1258.BI disable_lat \fR=\fPbool
1259Disable measurements of total latency numbers. Useful only for cutting
1260back the number of calls to \fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2), as that does impact performance at
1261really high IOPS rates. Note that to really get rid of a large amount of these
1262calls, this option must be used with disable_slat and disable_bw as well.
1263.TP
1264.BI disable_clat \fR=\fPbool
1265Disable measurements of completion latency numbers. See \fBdisable_lat\fR.
1266.TP
1267.BI disable_slat \fR=\fPbool
1268Disable measurements of submission latency numbers. See \fBdisable_lat\fR.
1269.TP
1270.BI disable_bw_measurement \fR=\fPbool
1271Disable measurements of throughput/bandwidth numbers. See \fBdisable_lat\fR.
1272.TP
1273.BI lockmem \fR=\fPint
1274Pin the specified amount of memory with \fBmlock\fR\|(2). Can be used to
1275simulate a smaller amount of memory. The amount specified is per worker.
1276.TP
1277.BI exec_prerun \fR=\fPstr
1278Before running the job, execute the specified command with \fBsystem\fR\|(3).
1279.RS
1280Output is redirected in a file called \fBjobname.prerun.txt\fR
1281.RE
1282.TP
1283.BI exec_postrun \fR=\fPstr
1284Same as \fBexec_prerun\fR, but the command is executed after the job completes.
1285.RS
1286Output is redirected in a file called \fBjobname.postrun.txt\fR
1287.RE
1288.TP
1289.BI ioscheduler \fR=\fPstr
1290Attempt to switch the device hosting the file to the specified I/O scheduler.
1291.TP
1292.BI disk_util \fR=\fPbool
1293Generate disk utilization statistics if the platform supports it. Default: true.
1294.TP
1295.BI clocksource \fR=\fPstr
1296Use the given clocksource as the base of timing. The supported options are:
1297.RS
1298.TP
1299.B gettimeofday
1300\fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2)
1301.TP
1302.B clock_gettime
1303\fBclock_gettime\fR\|(2)
1304.TP
1305.B cpu
1306Internal CPU clock source
1307.TP
1308.RE
1309.P
1310\fBcpu\fR is the preferred clocksource if it is reliable, as it is very fast
1311(and fio is heavy on time calls). Fio will automatically use this clocksource
1312if it's supported and considered reliable on the system it is running on,
1313unless another clocksource is specifically set. For x86/x86-64 CPUs, this
1314means supporting TSC Invariant.
1315.TP
1316.BI gtod_reduce \fR=\fPbool
1317Enable all of the \fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2) reducing options (disable_clat, disable_slat,
1318disable_bw) plus reduce precision of the timeout somewhat to really shrink the
1319\fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2) call count. With this option enabled, we only do about 0.4% of
1320the gtod() calls we would have done if all time keeping was enabled.
1321.TP
1322.BI gtod_cpu \fR=\fPint
1323Sometimes it's cheaper to dedicate a single thread of execution to just getting
1324the current time. Fio (and databases, for instance) are very intensive on
1325\fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2) calls. With this option, you can set one CPU aside for doing
1326nothing but logging current time to a shared memory location. Then the other
1327threads/processes that run IO workloads need only copy that segment, instead of
1328entering the kernel with a \fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2) call. The CPU set aside for doing
1329these time calls will be excluded from other uses. Fio will manually clear it
1330from the CPU mask of other jobs.
1331.TP
1332.BI ignore_error \fR=\fPstr
1333Sometimes you want to ignore some errors during test in that case you can specify
1334error list for each error type.
1335.br
1336ignore_error=READ_ERR_LIST,WRITE_ERR_LIST,VERIFY_ERR_LIST
1337.br
1338errors for given error type is separated with ':'.
1339Error may be symbol ('ENOSPC', 'ENOMEM') or an integer.
1340.br
1341Example: ignore_error=EAGAIN,ENOSPC:122 .
1342.br
1343This option will ignore EAGAIN from READ, and ENOSPC and 122(EDQUOT) from WRITE.
1344.TP
1345.BI error_dump \fR=\fPbool
1346If set dump every error even if it is non fatal, true by default. If disabled
1347only fatal error will be dumped
1348.TP
1349.BI profile \fR=\fPstr
1350Select a specific builtin performance test.
1351.TP
1352.BI cgroup \fR=\fPstr
1353Add job to this control group. If it doesn't exist, it will be created.
1354The system must have a mounted cgroup blkio mount point for this to work. If
1355your system doesn't have it mounted, you can do so with:
1356
1357# mount \-t cgroup \-o blkio none /cgroup
1358.TP
1359.BI cgroup_weight \fR=\fPint
1360Set the weight of the cgroup to this value. See the documentation that comes
1361with the kernel, allowed values are in the range of 100..1000.
1362.TP
1363.BI cgroup_nodelete \fR=\fPbool
1364Normally fio will delete the cgroups it has created after the job completion.
1365To override this behavior and to leave cgroups around after the job completion,
1366set cgroup_nodelete=1. This can be useful if one wants to inspect various
1367cgroup files after job completion. Default: false
1368.TP
1369.BI uid \fR=\fPint
1370Instead of running as the invoking user, set the user ID to this value before
1371the thread/process does any work.
1372.TP
1373.BI gid \fR=\fPint
1374Set group ID, see \fBuid\fR.
1375.TP
1376.BI unit_base \fR=\fPint
1377Base unit for reporting. Allowed values are:
1378.RS
1379.TP
1380.B 0
1381Use auto-detection (default).
1382.TP
1383.B 8
1384Byte based.
1385.TP
1386.B 1
1387Bit based.
1388.RE
1389.P
1390.TP
1391.BI flow_id \fR=\fPint
1392The ID of the flow. If not specified, it defaults to being a global flow. See
1393\fBflow\fR.
1394.TP
1395.BI flow \fR=\fPint
1396Weight in token-based flow control. If this value is used, then there is a
1397\fBflow counter\fR which is used to regulate the proportion of activity between
1398two or more jobs. fio attempts to keep this flow counter near zero. The
1399\fBflow\fR parameter stands for how much should be added or subtracted to the
1400flow counter on each iteration of the main I/O loop. That is, if one job has
1401\fBflow=8\fR and another job has \fBflow=-1\fR, then there will be a roughly
14021:8 ratio in how much one runs vs the other.
1403.TP
1404.BI flow_watermark \fR=\fPint
1405The maximum value that the absolute value of the flow counter is allowed to
1406reach before the job must wait for a lower value of the counter.
1407.TP
1408.BI flow_sleep \fR=\fPint
1409The period of time, in microseconds, to wait after the flow watermark has been
1410exceeded before retrying operations
1411.TP
1412.BI clat_percentiles \fR=\fPbool
1413Enable the reporting of percentiles of completion latencies.
1414.TP
1415.BI percentile_list \fR=\fPfloat_list
1416Overwrite the default list of percentiles for completion
1417latencies. Each number is a floating number in the range (0,100], and
1418the maximum length of the list is 20. Use ':' to separate the
1419numbers. For example, \-\-percentile_list=99.5:99.9 will cause fio to
1420report the values of completion latency below which 99.5% and 99.9% of
1421the observed latencies fell, respectively.
1422.SS "Ioengine Parameters List"
1423Some parameters are only valid when a specific ioengine is in use. These are
1424used identically to normal parameters, with the caveat that when used on the
1425command line, they must come after the ioengine.
1426.TP
1427.BI (cpu)cpuload \fR=\fPint
1428Attempt to use the specified percentage of CPU cycles.
1429.TP
1430.BI (cpu)cpuchunks \fR=\fPint
1431Split the load into cycles of the given time. In microseconds.
1432.TP
1433.BI (cpu)exit_on_io_done \fR=\fPbool
1434Detect when IO threads are done, then exit.
1435.TP
1436.BI (libaio)userspace_reap
1437Normally, with the libaio engine in use, fio will use
1438the io_getevents system call to reap newly returned events.
1439With this flag turned on, the AIO ring will be read directly
1440from user-space to reap events. The reaping mode is only
1441enabled when polling for a minimum of 0 events (eg when
1442iodepth_batch_complete=0).
1443.TP
1444.BI (net,netsplice)hostname \fR=\fPstr
1445The host name or IP address to use for TCP or UDP based IO.
1446If the job is a TCP listener or UDP reader, the hostname is not
1447used and must be omitted unless it is a valid UDP multicast address.
1448.TP
1449.BI (net,netsplice)port \fR=\fPint
1450The TCP or UDP port to bind to or connect to.
1451.TP
1452.BI (net,netsplice)interface \fR=\fPstr
1453The IP address of the network interface used to send or receive UDP multicast
1454packets.
1455.TP
1456.BI (net,netsplice)ttl \fR=\fPint
1457Time-to-live value for outgoing UDP multicast packets. Default: 1
1458.TP
1459.BI (net,netsplice)nodelay \fR=\fPbool
1460Set TCP_NODELAY on TCP connections.
1461.TP
1462.BI (net,netsplice)protocol \fR=\fPstr "\fR,\fP proto" \fR=\fPstr
1463The network protocol to use. Accepted values are:
1464.RS
1465.RS
1466.TP
1467.B tcp
1468Transmission control protocol
1469.TP
1470.B tcpv6
1471Transmission control protocol V6
1472.TP
1473.B udp
1474User datagram protocol
1475.TP
1476.B udpv6
1477User datagram protocol V6
1478.TP
1479.B unix
1480UNIX domain socket
1481.RE
1482.P
1483When the protocol is TCP or UDP, the port must also be given,
1484as well as the hostname if the job is a TCP listener or UDP
1485reader. For unix sockets, the normal filename option should be
1486used and the port is invalid.
1487.RE
1488.TP
1489.BI (net,netsplice)listen
1490For TCP network connections, tell fio to listen for incoming
1491connections rather than initiating an outgoing connection. The
1492hostname must be omitted if this option is used.
1493.TP
1494.BI (net, pingpong) \fR=\fPbool
1495Normally a network writer will just continue writing data, and a network reader
1496will just consume packets. If pingpong=1 is set, a writer will send its normal
1497payload to the reader, then wait for the reader to send the same payload back.
1498This allows fio to measure network latencies. The submission and completion
1499latencies then measure local time spent sending or receiving, and the
1500completion latency measures how long it took for the other end to receive and
1501send back. For UDP multicast traffic pingpong=1 should only be set for a single
1502reader when multiple readers are listening to the same address.
1503.TP
1504.BI (e4defrag,donorname) \fR=\fPstr
1505File will be used as a block donor (swap extents between files)
1506.TP
1507.BI (e4defrag,inplace) \fR=\fPint
1508Configure donor file block allocation strategy
1509.RS
1510.BI 0(default) :
1511Preallocate donor's file on init
1512.TP
1513.BI 1:
1514allocate space immediately inside defragment event, and free right after event
1515.RE
1516.TP
1517.BI (rbd)rbdname \fR=\fPstr
1518Specifies the name of the RBD.
1519.TP
1520.BI (rbd)pool \fR=\fPstr
1521Specifies the name of the Ceph pool containing the RBD.
1522.TP
1523.BI (rbd)clientname \fR=\fPstr
1524Specifies the username (without the 'client.' prefix) used to access the Ceph cluster.
1525.SH OUTPUT
1526While running, \fBfio\fR will display the status of the created jobs. For
1527example:
1528.RS
1529.P
1530Threads: 1: [_r] [24.8% done] [ 13509/ 8334 kb/s] [eta 00h:01m:31s]
1531.RE
1532.P
1533The characters in the first set of brackets denote the current status of each
1534threads. The possible values are:
1535.P
1536.PD 0
1537.RS
1538.TP
1539.B P
1540Setup but not started.
1541.TP
1542.B C
1543Thread created.
1544.TP
1545.B I
1546Initialized, waiting.
1547.TP
1548.B R
1549Running, doing sequential reads.
1550.TP
1551.B r
1552Running, doing random reads.
1553.TP
1554.B W
1555Running, doing sequential writes.
1556.TP
1557.B w
1558Running, doing random writes.
1559.TP
1560.B M
1561Running, doing mixed sequential reads/writes.
1562.TP
1563.B m
1564Running, doing mixed random reads/writes.
1565.TP
1566.B F
1567Running, currently waiting for \fBfsync\fR\|(2).
1568.TP
1569.B V
1570Running, verifying written data.
1571.TP
1572.B E
1573Exited, not reaped by main thread.
1574.TP
1575.B \-
1576Exited, thread reaped.
1577.RE
1578.PD
1579.P
1580The second set of brackets shows the estimated completion percentage of
1581the current group. The third set shows the read and write I/O rate,
1582respectively. Finally, the estimated run time of the job is displayed.
1583.P
1584When \fBfio\fR completes (or is interrupted by Ctrl-C), it will show data
1585for each thread, each group of threads, and each disk, in that order.
1586.P
1587Per-thread statistics first show the threads client number, group-id, and
1588error code. The remaining figures are as follows:
1589.RS
1590.TP
1591.B io
1592Number of megabytes of I/O performed.
1593.TP
1594.B bw
1595Average data rate (bandwidth).
1596.TP
1597.B runt
1598Threads run time.
1599.TP
1600.B slat
1601Submission latency minimum, maximum, average and standard deviation. This is
1602the time it took to submit the I/O.
1603.TP
1604.B clat
1605Completion latency minimum, maximum, average and standard deviation. This
1606is the time between submission and completion.
1607.TP
1608.B bw
1609Bandwidth minimum, maximum, percentage of aggregate bandwidth received, average
1610and standard deviation.
1611.TP
1612.B cpu
1613CPU usage statistics. Includes user and system time, number of context switches
1614this thread went through and number of major and minor page faults.
1615.TP
1616.B IO depths
1617Distribution of I/O depths. Each depth includes everything less than (or equal)
1618to it, but greater than the previous depth.
1619.TP
1620.B IO issued
1621Number of read/write requests issued, and number of short read/write requests.
1622.TP
1623.B IO latencies
1624Distribution of I/O completion latencies. The numbers follow the same pattern
1625as \fBIO depths\fR.
1626.RE
1627.P
1628The group statistics show:
1629.PD 0
1630.RS
1631.TP
1632.B io
1633Number of megabytes I/O performed.
1634.TP
1635.B aggrb
1636Aggregate bandwidth of threads in the group.
1637.TP
1638.B minb
1639Minimum average bandwidth a thread saw.
1640.TP
1641.B maxb
1642Maximum average bandwidth a thread saw.
1643.TP
1644.B mint
1645Shortest runtime of threads in the group.
1646.TP
1647.B maxt
1648Longest runtime of threads in the group.
1649.RE
1650.PD
1651.P
1652Finally, disk statistics are printed with reads first:
1653.PD 0
1654.RS
1655.TP
1656.B ios
1657Number of I/Os performed by all groups.
1658.TP
1659.B merge
1660Number of merges in the I/O scheduler.
1661.TP
1662.B ticks
1663Number of ticks we kept the disk busy.
1664.TP
1665.B io_queue
1666Total time spent in the disk queue.
1667.TP
1668.B util
1669Disk utilization.
1670.RE
1671.PD
1672.P
1673It is also possible to get fio to dump the current output while it is
1674running, without terminating the job. To do that, send fio the \fBUSR1\fR
1675signal.
1676.SH TERSE OUTPUT
1677If the \fB\-\-minimal\fR / \fB\-\-append-terse\fR options are given, the
1678results will be printed/appended in a semicolon-delimited format suitable for
1679scripted use.
1680A job description (if provided) follows on a new line. Note that the first
1681number in the line is the version number. If the output has to be changed
1682for some reason, this number will be incremented by 1 to signify that
1683change. The fields are:
1684.P
1685.RS
1686.B terse version, fio version, jobname, groupid, error
1687.P
1688Read status:
1689.RS
1690.B Total I/O \fR(KB)\fP, bandwidth \fR(KB/s)\fP, IOPS, runtime \fR(ms)\fP
1691.P
1692Submission latency:
1693.RS
1694.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1695.RE
1696Completion latency:
1697.RS
1698.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1699.RE
1700Completion latency percentiles (20 fields):
1701.RS
1702.B Xth percentile=usec
1703.RE
1704Total latency:
1705.RS
1706.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1707.RE
1708Bandwidth:
1709.RS
1710.B min, max, aggregate percentage of total, mean, standard deviation
1711.RE
1712.RE
1713.P
1714Write status:
1715.RS
1716.B Total I/O \fR(KB)\fP, bandwidth \fR(KB/s)\fP, IOPS, runtime \fR(ms)\fP
1717.P
1718Submission latency:
1719.RS
1720.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1721.RE
1722Completion latency:
1723.RS
1724.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1725.RE
1726Completion latency percentiles (20 fields):
1727.RS
1728.B Xth percentile=usec
1729.RE
1730Total latency:
1731.RS
1732.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1733.RE
1734Bandwidth:
1735.RS
1736.B min, max, aggregate percentage of total, mean, standard deviation
1737.RE
1738.RE
1739.P
1740CPU usage:
1741.RS
1742.B user, system, context switches, major page faults, minor page faults
1743.RE
1744.P
1745IO depth distribution:
1746.RS
1747.B <=1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, >=64
1748.RE
1749.P
1750IO latency distribution:
1751.RS
1752Microseconds:
1753.RS
1754.B <=2, 4, 10, 20, 50, 100, 250, 500, 750, 1000
1755.RE
1756Milliseconds:
1757.RS
1758.B <=2, 4, 10, 20, 50, 100, 250, 500, 750, 1000, 2000, >=2000
1759.RE
1760.RE
1761.P
1762Disk utilization (1 for each disk used):
1763.RS
1764.B name, read ios, write ios, read merges, write merges, read ticks, write ticks, read in-queue time, write in-queue time, disk utilization percentage
1765.RE
1766.P
1767Error Info (dependent on continue_on_error, default off):
1768.RS
1769.B total # errors, first error code
1770.RE
1771.P
1772.B text description (if provided in config - appears on newline)
1773.RE
1774.SH CLIENT / SERVER
1775Normally you would run fio as a stand-alone application on the machine
1776where the IO workload should be generated. However, it is also possible to
1777run the frontend and backend of fio separately. This makes it possible to
1778have a fio server running on the machine(s) where the IO workload should
1779be running, while controlling it from another machine.
1780
1781To start the server, you would do:
1782
1783\fBfio \-\-server=args\fR
1784
1785on that machine, where args defines what fio listens to. The arguments
1786are of the form 'type:hostname or IP:port'. 'type' is either 'ip' (or ip4)
1787for TCP/IP v4, 'ip6' for TCP/IP v6, or 'sock' for a local unix domain
1788socket. 'hostname' is either a hostname or IP address, and 'port' is the port to
1789listen to (only valid for TCP/IP, not a local socket). Some examples:
1790
17911) fio \-\-server
1792
1793 Start a fio server, listening on all interfaces on the default port (8765).
1794
17952) fio \-\-server=ip:hostname,4444
1796
1797 Start a fio server, listening on IP belonging to hostname and on port 4444.
1798
17993) fio \-\-server=ip6:::1,4444
1800
1801 Start a fio server, listening on IPv6 localhost ::1 and on port 4444.
1802
18034) fio \-\-server=,4444
1804
1805 Start a fio server, listening on all interfaces on port 4444.
1806
18075) fio \-\-server=1.2.3.4
1808
1809 Start a fio server, listening on IP 1.2.3.4 on the default port.
1810
18116) fio \-\-server=sock:/tmp/fio.sock
1812
1813 Start a fio server, listening on the local socket /tmp/fio.sock.
1814
1815When a server is running, you can connect to it from a client. The client
1816is run with:
1817
1818fio \-\-local-args \-\-client=server \-\-remote-args <job file(s)>
1819
1820where \-\-local-args are arguments that are local to the client where it is
1821running, 'server' is the connect string, and \-\-remote-args and <job file(s)>
1822are sent to the server. The 'server' string follows the same format as it
1823does on the server side, to allow IP/hostname/socket and port strings.
1824You can connect to multiple clients as well, to do that you could run:
1825
1826fio \-\-client=server2 \-\-client=server2 <job file(s)>
1827.SH AUTHORS
1828
1829.B fio
1830was written by Jens Axboe <jens.axboe@oracle.com>,
1831now Jens Axboe <jaxboe@fusionio.com>.
1832.br
1833This man page was written by Aaron Carroll <aaronc@cse.unsw.edu.au> based
1834on documentation by Jens Axboe.
1835.SH "REPORTING BUGS"
1836Report bugs to the \fBfio\fR mailing list <fio@vger.kernel.org>.
1837See \fBREADME\fR.
1838.SH "SEE ALSO"
1839For further documentation see \fBHOWTO\fR and \fBREADME\fR.
1840.br
1841Sample jobfiles are available in the \fBexamples\fR directory.
1842