Improve logging accuracy
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1.TH fio 1 "December 2014" "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 \-\-output-format \fR=\fPformat
24Set the reporting format to \fInormal\fR, \fIterse\fR, \fIjson\fR, or
25\fIjson+\fR. Multiple formats can be selected, separate by a comma. \fIterse\fR
26is a CSV based format. \fIjson+\fR is like \fIjson\fR, except it adds a full
27dump of the latency buckets.
28.TP
29.BI \-\-runtime \fR=\fPruntime
30Limit run time to \fIruntime\fR seconds.
31.TP
32.B \-\-bandwidth\-log
33Generate per-job bandwidth logs.
34.TP
35.B \-\-minimal
36Print statistics in a terse, semicolon-delimited format.
37.TP
38.B \-\-append-terse
39Print statistics in selected mode AND terse, semicolon-delimited format.
40Deprecated, use \-\-output-format instead to select multiple formats.
41.TP
42.B \-\-version
43Display version information and exit.
44.TP
45.BI \-\-terse\-version \fR=\fPversion
46Set terse version output format (Current version 3, or older version 2).
47.TP
48.B \-\-help
49Display usage information and exit.
50.TP
51.B \-\-cpuclock-test
52Perform test and validation of internal CPU clock
53.TP
54.BI \-\-crctest[\fR=\fPtest]
55Test the speed of the builtin checksumming functions. If no argument is given,
56all of them are tested. Or a comma separated list can be passed, in which
57case the given ones are tested.
58.TP
59.BI \-\-cmdhelp \fR=\fPcommand
60Print help information for \fIcommand\fR. May be `all' for all commands.
61.TP
62.BI \-\-enghelp \fR=\fPioengine[,command]
63List all commands defined by \fIioengine\fR, or print help for \fIcommand\fR defined by \fIioengine\fR.
64.TP
65.BI \-\-showcmd \fR=\fPjobfile
66Convert \fIjobfile\fR to a set of command-line options.
67.TP
68.BI \-\-eta \fR=\fPwhen
69Specifies when real-time ETA estimate should be printed. \fIwhen\fR may
70be one of `always', `never' or `auto'.
71.TP
72.BI \-\-eta\-newline \fR=\fPtime
73Force an ETA newline for every `time` period passed.
74.TP
75.BI \-\-status\-interval \fR=\fPtime
76Report full output status every `time` period passed.
77.TP
78.BI \-\-readonly
79Turn on safety read-only checks, preventing any attempted write.
80.TP
81.BI \-\-section \fR=\fPsec
82Only run section \fIsec\fR from job file. This option can be used multiple times to add more sections to run.
83.TP
84.BI \-\-alloc\-size \fR=\fPkb
85Set the internal smalloc pool size to \fIkb\fP kilobytes.
86.TP
87.BI \-\-warnings\-fatal
88All fio parser warnings are fatal, causing fio to exit with an error.
89.TP
90.BI \-\-max\-jobs \fR=\fPnr
91Set the maximum allowed number of jobs (threads/processes) to support.
92.TP
93.BI \-\-server \fR=\fPargs
94Start a backend server, with \fIargs\fP specifying what to listen to. See client/server section.
95.TP
96.BI \-\-daemonize \fR=\fPpidfile
97Background a fio server, writing the pid to the given pid file.
98.TP
99.BI \-\-client \fR=\fPhost
100Instead of running the jobs locally, send and run them on the given host or set of hosts. See client/server section.
101.TP
102.BI \-\-idle\-prof \fR=\fPoption
103Report cpu idleness on a system or percpu basis (\fIoption\fP=system,percpu) or run unit work calibration only (\fIoption\fP=calibrate).
104.SH "JOB FILE FORMAT"
105Job files are in `ini' format. They consist of one or more
106job definitions, which begin with a job name in square brackets and
107extend to the next job name. The job name can be any ASCII string
108except `global', which has a special meaning. Following the job name is
109a sequence of zero or more parameters, one per line, that define the
110behavior of the job. Any line starting with a `;' or `#' character is
111considered a comment and ignored.
112.P
113If \fIjobfile\fR is specified as `-', the job file will be read from
114standard input.
115.SS "Global Section"
116The global section contains default parameters for jobs specified in the
117job file. A job is only affected by global sections residing above it,
118and there may be any number of global sections. Specific job definitions
119may override any parameter set in global sections.
120.SH "JOB PARAMETERS"
121.SS Types
122Some parameters may take arguments of a specific type.
123Anywhere a numeric value is required, an arithmetic expression may be used,
124provided it is surrounded by parentheses. Supported operators are:
125.RS
126.RS
127.TP
128.B addition (+)
129.TP
130.B subtraction (-)
131.TP
132.B multiplication (*)
133.TP
134.B division (/)
135.TP
136.B modulus (%)
137.TP
138.B exponentiation (^)
139.RE
140.RE
141.P
142For time values in expressions, units are microseconds by default. This is
143different than for time values not in expressions (not enclosed in
144parentheses). The types used are:
145.TP
146.I str
147String: a sequence of alphanumeric characters.
148.TP
149.I int
150SI integer: a whole number, possibly containing a suffix denoting the base unit
151of the value. Accepted suffixes are `k', 'M', 'G', 'T', and 'P', denoting
152kilo (1024), mega (1024^2), giga (1024^3), tera (1024^4), and peta (1024^5)
153respectively. If prefixed with '0x', the value is assumed to be base 16
154(hexadecimal). A suffix may include a trailing 'b', for instance 'kb' is
155identical to 'k'. You can specify a base 10 value by using 'KiB', 'MiB','GiB',
156etc. This is useful for disk drives where values are often given in base 10
157values. Specifying '30GiB' will get you 30*1000^3 bytes.
158When specifying times the default suffix meaning changes, still denoting the
159base unit of the value, but accepted suffixes are 'D' (days), 'H' (hours), 'M'
160(minutes), 'S' Seconds, 'ms' (or msec) milli seconds, 'us' (or 'usec') micro
161seconds. Time values without a unit specify seconds.
162The suffixes are not case sensitive.
163.TP
164.I bool
165Boolean: a true or false value. `0' denotes false, `1' denotes true.
166.TP
167.I irange
168Integer range: a range of integers specified in the format
169\fIlower\fR:\fIupper\fR or \fIlower\fR\-\fIupper\fR. \fIlower\fR and
170\fIupper\fR may contain a suffix as described above. If an option allows two
171sets of ranges, they are separated with a `,' or `/' character. For example:
172`8\-8k/8M\-4G'.
173.TP
174.I float_list
175List of floating numbers: A list of floating numbers, separated by
176a ':' character.
177.SS "Parameter List"
178.TP
179.BI name \fR=\fPstr
180May be used to override the job name. On the command line, this parameter
181has the special purpose of signalling the start of a new job.
182.TP
183.BI wait_for \fR=\fPstr
184Specifies the name of the already defined job to wait for. Single waitee name
185only may be specified. If set, the job won't be started until all workers of
186the waitee job are done. Wait_for operates on the job name basis, so there are
187a few limitations. First, the waitee must be defined prior to the waiter job
188(meaning no forward references). Second, if a job is being referenced as a
189waitee, it must have a unique name (no duplicate waitees).
190.TP
191.BI description \fR=\fPstr
192Human-readable description of the job. It is printed when the job is run, but
193otherwise has no special purpose.
194.TP
195.BI directory \fR=\fPstr
196Prefix filenames with this directory. Used to place files in a location other
197than `./'.
198You can specify a number of directories by separating the names with a ':'
199character. These directories will be assigned equally distributed to job clones
200creates with \fInumjobs\fR as long as they are using generated filenames.
201If specific \fIfilename(s)\fR are set fio will use the first listed directory,
202and thereby matching the \fIfilename\fR semantic which generates a file each
203clone if not specified, but let all clones use the same if set. See
204\fIfilename\fR for considerations regarding escaping certain characters on
205some platforms.
206.TP
207.BI filename \fR=\fPstr
208.B fio
209normally makes up a file name based on the job name, thread number, and file
210number. If you want to share files between threads in a job or several jobs,
211specify a \fIfilename\fR for each of them to override the default.
212If the I/O engine is file-based, you can specify
213a number of files by separating the names with a `:' character. `\-' is a
214reserved name, meaning stdin or stdout, depending on the read/write direction
215set. On Windows, disk devices are accessed as \\.\PhysicalDrive0 for the first
216device, \\.\PhysicalDrive1 for the second etc. Note: Windows and FreeBSD
217prevent write access to areas of the disk containing in-use data
218(e.g. filesystems). If the wanted filename does need to include a colon, then
219escape that with a '\\' character. For instance, if the filename is
220"/dev/dsk/foo@3,0:c", then you would use filename="/dev/dsk/foo@3,0\\:c".
221.TP
222.BI filename_format \fR=\fPstr
223If sharing multiple files between jobs, it is usually necessary to have
224fio generate the exact names that you want. By default, fio will name a file
225based on the default file format specification of
226\fBjobname.jobnumber.filenumber\fP. With this option, that can be
227customized. Fio will recognize and replace the following keywords in this
228string:
229.RS
230.RS
231.TP
232.B $jobname
233The name of the worker thread or process.
234.TP
235.B $jobnum
236The incremental number of the worker thread or process.
237.TP
238.B $filenum
239The incremental number of the file for that worker thread or process.
240.RE
241.P
242To have dependent jobs share a set of files, this option can be set to
243have fio generate filenames that are shared between the two. For instance,
244if \fBtestfiles.$filenum\fR is specified, file number 4 for any job will
245be named \fBtestfiles.4\fR. The default of \fB$jobname.$jobnum.$filenum\fR
246will be used if no other format specifier is given.
247.RE
248.P
249.TP
250.BI lockfile \fR=\fPstr
251Fio defaults to not locking any files before it does IO to them. If a file or
252file descriptor is shared, fio can serialize IO to that file to make the end
253result consistent. This is usual for emulating real workloads that share files.
254The lock modes are:
255.RS
256.RS
257.TP
258.B none
259No locking. This is the default.
260.TP
261.B exclusive
262Only one thread or process may do IO at a time, excluding all others.
263.TP
264.B readwrite
265Read-write locking on the file. Many readers may access the file at the same
266time, but writes get exclusive access.
267.RE
268.RE
269.P
270.BI opendir \fR=\fPstr
271Recursively open any files below directory \fIstr\fR.
272.TP
273.BI readwrite \fR=\fPstr "\fR,\fP rw" \fR=\fPstr
274Type of I/O pattern. Accepted values are:
275.RS
276.RS
277.TP
278.B read
279Sequential reads.
280.TP
281.B write
282Sequential writes.
283.TP
284.B trim
285Sequential trim (Linux block devices only).
286.TP
287.B randread
288Random reads.
289.TP
290.B randwrite
291Random writes.
292.TP
293.B randtrim
294Random trim (Linux block devices only).
295.TP
296.B rw, readwrite
297Mixed sequential reads and writes.
298.TP
299.B randrw
300Mixed random reads and writes.
301.TP
302.B trimwrite
303Trim and write mixed workload. Blocks will be trimmed first, then the same
304blocks will be written to.
305.RE
306.P
307For mixed I/O, the default split is 50/50. For certain types of io the result
308may still be skewed a bit, since the speed may be different. It is possible to
309specify a number of IO's to do before getting a new offset, this is done by
310appending a `:\fI<nr>\fR to the end of the string given. For a random read, it
311would look like \fBrw=randread:8\fR for passing in an offset modifier with a
312value of 8. If the postfix is used with a sequential IO pattern, then the value
313specified will be added to the generated offset for each IO. For instance,
314using \fBrw=write:4k\fR will skip 4k for every write. It turns sequential IO
315into sequential IO with holes. See the \fBrw_sequencer\fR option.
316.RE
317.TP
318.BI rw_sequencer \fR=\fPstr
319If an offset modifier is given by appending a number to the \fBrw=<str>\fR line,
320then this option controls how that number modifies the IO offset being
321generated. Accepted values are:
322.RS
323.RS
324.TP
325.B sequential
326Generate sequential offset
327.TP
328.B identical
329Generate the same offset
330.RE
331.P
332\fBsequential\fR is only useful for random IO, where fio would normally
333generate a new random offset for every IO. If you append eg 8 to randread, you
334would get a new random offset for every 8 IO's. The result would be a seek for
335only every 8 IO's, instead of for every IO. Use \fBrw=randread:8\fR to specify
336that. As sequential IO is already sequential, setting \fBsequential\fR for that
337would not result in any differences. \fBidentical\fR behaves in a similar
338fashion, except it sends the same offset 8 number of times before generating a
339new offset.
340.RE
341.P
342.TP
343.BI kb_base \fR=\fPint
344The base unit for a kilobyte. The defacto base is 2^10, 1024. Storage
345manufacturers like to use 10^3 or 1000 as a base ten unit instead, for obvious
346reasons. Allowed values are 1024 or 1000, with 1024 being the default.
347.TP
348.BI unified_rw_reporting \fR=\fPbool
349Fio normally reports statistics on a per data direction basis, meaning that
350read, write, and trim are accounted and reported separately. If this option is
351set fio sums the results and reports them as "mixed" instead.
352.TP
353.BI randrepeat \fR=\fPbool
354Seed the random number generator used for random I/O patterns in a predictable
355way so the pattern is repeatable across runs. Default: true.
356.TP
357.BI allrandrepeat \fR=\fPbool
358Seed all random number generators in a predictable way so results are
359repeatable across runs. Default: false.
360.TP
361.BI randseed \fR=\fPint
362Seed the random number generators based on this seed value, to be able to
363control what sequence of output is being generated. If not set, the random
364sequence depends on the \fBrandrepeat\fR setting.
365.TP
366.BI fallocate \fR=\fPstr
367Whether pre-allocation is performed when laying down files. Accepted values
368are:
369.RS
370.RS
371.TP
372.B none
373Do not pre-allocate space.
374.TP
375.B posix
376Pre-allocate via \fBposix_fallocate\fR\|(3).
377.TP
378.B keep
379Pre-allocate via \fBfallocate\fR\|(2) with FALLOC_FL_KEEP_SIZE set.
380.TP
381.B 0
382Backward-compatible alias for 'none'.
383.TP
384.B 1
385Backward-compatible alias for 'posix'.
386.RE
387.P
388May not be available on all supported platforms. 'keep' is only
389available on Linux. If using ZFS on Solaris this must be set to 'none'
390because ZFS doesn't support it. Default: 'posix'.
391.RE
392.TP
393.BI fadvise_hint \fR=\fPbool
394Use \fBposix_fadvise\fR\|(2) to advise the kernel what I/O patterns
395are likely to be issued. Default: true.
396.TP
397.BI fadvise_stream \fR=\fPint
398Use \fBposix_fadvise\fR\|(2) to advise the kernel what stream ID the
399writes issued belong to. Only supported on Linux. Note, this option
400may change going forward.
401.TP
402.BI size \fR=\fPint
403Total size of I/O for this job. \fBfio\fR will run until this many bytes have
404been transferred, unless limited by other options (\fBruntime\fR, for instance,
405or increased/descreased by \fBio_size\fR). Unless \fBnrfiles\fR and
406\fBfilesize\fR options are given, this amount will be divided between the
407available files for the job. If not set, fio will use the full size of the
408given files or devices. If the files do not exist, size must be given. It is
409also possible to give size as a percentage between 1 and 100. If size=20% is
410given, fio will use 20% of the full size of the given files or devices.
411.TP
412.BI io_size \fR=\fPint "\fR,\fB io_limit \fR=\fPint
413Normally fio operates within the region set by \fBsize\fR, which means that
414the \fBsize\fR option sets both the region and size of IO to be performed.
415Sometimes that is not what you want. With this option, it is possible to
416define just the amount of IO that fio should do. For instance, if \fBsize\fR
417is set to 20G and \fBio_limit\fR is set to 5G, fio will perform IO within
418the first 20G but exit when 5G have been done. The opposite is also
419possible - if \fBsize\fR is set to 20G, and \fBio_size\fR is set to 40G, then
420fio will do 40G of IO within the 0..20G region.
421.TP
422.BI fill_device \fR=\fPbool "\fR,\fB fill_fs" \fR=\fPbool
423Sets size to something really large and waits for ENOSPC (no space left on
424device) as the terminating condition. Only makes sense with sequential write.
425For a read workload, the mount point will be filled first then IO started on
426the result. This option doesn't make sense if operating on a raw device node,
427since the size of that is already known by the file system. Additionally,
428writing beyond end-of-device will not return ENOSPC there.
429.TP
430.BI filesize \fR=\fPirange
431Individual file sizes. May be a range, in which case \fBfio\fR will select sizes
432for files at random within the given range, limited to \fBsize\fR in total (if
433that is given). If \fBfilesize\fR is not specified, each created file is the
434same size.
435.TP
436.BI file_append \fR=\fPbool
437Perform IO after the end of the file. Normally fio will operate within the
438size of a file. If this option is set, then fio will append to the file
439instead. This has identical behavior to setting \fRoffset\fP to the size
440of a file. This option is ignored on non-regular files.
441.TP
442.BI blocksize \fR=\fPint[,int] "\fR,\fB bs" \fR=\fPint[,int]
443Block size for I/O units. Default: 4k. Values for reads, writes, and trims
444can be specified separately in the format \fIread\fR,\fIwrite\fR,\fItrim\fR
445either of which may be empty to leave that value at its default. If a trailing
446comma isn't given, the remainder will inherit the last value set.
447.TP
448.BI blocksize_range \fR=\fPirange[,irange] "\fR,\fB bsrange" \fR=\fPirange[,irange]
449Specify a range of I/O block sizes. The issued I/O unit will always be a
450multiple of the minimum size, unless \fBblocksize_unaligned\fR is set. Applies
451to both reads and writes if only one range is given, but can be specified
452separately with a comma separating the values. Example: bsrange=1k-4k,2k-8k.
453Also (see \fBblocksize\fR).
454.TP
455.BI bssplit \fR=\fPstr
456This option allows even finer grained control of the block sizes issued,
457not just even splits between them. With this option, you can weight various
458block sizes for exact control of the issued IO for a job that has mixed
459block sizes. The format of the option is bssplit=blocksize/percentage,
460optionally adding as many definitions as needed separated by a colon.
461Example: bssplit=4k/10:64k/50:32k/40 would issue 50% 64k blocks, 10% 4k
462blocks and 40% 32k blocks. \fBbssplit\fR also supports giving separate
463splits to reads and writes. The format is identical to what the
464\fBbs\fR option accepts, the read and write parts are separated with a
465comma.
466.TP
467.B blocksize_unaligned\fR,\fP bs_unaligned
468If set, any size in \fBblocksize_range\fR may be used. This typically won't
469work with direct I/O, as that normally requires sector alignment.
470.TP
471.BI blockalign \fR=\fPint[,int] "\fR,\fB ba" \fR=\fPint[,int]
472At what boundary to align random IO offsets. Defaults to the same as 'blocksize'
473the minimum blocksize given. Minimum alignment is typically 512b
474for using direct IO, though it usually depends on the hardware block size.
475This option is mutually exclusive with using a random map for files, so it
476will turn off that option.
477.TP
478.BI bs_is_seq_rand \fR=\fPbool
479If this option is set, fio will use the normal read,write blocksize settings as
480sequential,random instead. Any random read or write will use the WRITE
481blocksize settings, and any sequential read or write will use the READ
482blocksize setting.
483.TP
484.B zero_buffers
485Initialize buffers with all zeros. Default: fill buffers with random data.
486.TP
487.B refill_buffers
488If this option is given, fio will refill the IO buffers on every submit. The
489default is to only fill it at init time and reuse that data. Only makes sense
490if zero_buffers isn't specified, naturally. If data verification is enabled,
491refill_buffers is also automatically enabled.
492.TP
493.BI scramble_buffers \fR=\fPbool
494If \fBrefill_buffers\fR is too costly and the target is using data
495deduplication, then setting this option will slightly modify the IO buffer
496contents to defeat normal de-dupe attempts. This is not enough to defeat
497more clever block compression attempts, but it will stop naive dedupe
498of blocks. Default: true.
499.TP
500.BI buffer_compress_percentage \fR=\fPint
501If this is set, then fio will attempt to provide IO buffer content (on WRITEs)
502that compress to the specified level. Fio does this by providing a mix of
503random data and a fixed pattern. The fixed pattern is either zeroes, or the
504pattern specified by \fBbuffer_pattern\fR. If the pattern option is used, it
505might skew the compression ratio slightly. Note that this is per block size
506unit, for file/disk wide compression level that matches this setting. Note
507that this is per block size unit, for file/disk wide compression level that
508matches this setting, you'll also want to set refill_buffers.
509.TP
510.BI buffer_compress_chunk \fR=\fPint
511See \fBbuffer_compress_percentage\fR. This setting allows fio to manage how
512big the ranges of random data and zeroed data is. Without this set, fio will
513provide \fBbuffer_compress_percentage\fR of blocksize random data, followed by
514the remaining zeroed. With this set to some chunk size smaller than the block
515size, fio can alternate random and zeroed data throughout the IO buffer.
516.TP
517.BI buffer_pattern \fR=\fPstr
518If set, fio will fill the IO buffers with this pattern. If not set, the contents
519of IO buffers is defined by the other options related to buffer contents. The
520setting can be any pattern of bytes, and can be prefixed with 0x for hex
521values. It may also be a string, where the string must then be wrapped with
522"", e.g.:
523.RS
524.RS
525\fBbuffer_pattern\fR="abcd"
526.RS
527or
528.RE
529\fBbuffer_pattern\fR=-12
530.RS
531or
532.RE
533\fBbuffer_pattern\fR=0xdeadface
534.RE
535.LP
536Also you can combine everything together in any order:
537.LP
538.RS
539\fBbuffer_pattern\fR=0xdeadface"abcd"-12
540.RE
541.RE
542.TP
543.BI dedupe_percentage \fR=\fPint
544If set, fio will generate this percentage of identical buffers when writing.
545These buffers will be naturally dedupable. The contents of the buffers depend
546on what other buffer compression settings have been set. It's possible to have
547the individual buffers either fully compressible, or not at all. This option
548only controls the distribution of unique buffers.
549.TP
550.BI nrfiles \fR=\fPint
551Number of files to use for this job. Default: 1.
552.TP
553.BI openfiles \fR=\fPint
554Number of files to keep open at the same time. Default: \fBnrfiles\fR.
555.TP
556.BI file_service_type \fR=\fPstr
557Defines how files to service are selected. The following types are defined:
558.RS
559.RS
560.TP
561.B random
562Choose a file at random.
563.TP
564.B roundrobin
565Round robin over opened files (default).
566.TP
567.B sequential
568Do each file in the set sequentially.
569.RE
570.P
571The number of I/Os to issue before switching to a new file can be specified by
572appending `:\fIint\fR' to the service type.
573.RE
574.TP
575.BI ioengine \fR=\fPstr
576Defines how the job issues I/O. The following types are defined:
577.RS
578.RS
579.TP
580.B sync
581Basic \fBread\fR\|(2) or \fBwrite\fR\|(2) I/O. \fBfseek\fR\|(2) is used to
582position the I/O location.
583.TP
584.B psync
585Basic \fBpread\fR\|(2) or \fBpwrite\fR\|(2) I/O.
586.TP
587.B vsync
588Basic \fBreadv\fR\|(2) or \fBwritev\fR\|(2) I/O. Will emulate queuing by
589coalescing adjacent IOs into a single submission.
590.TP
591.B pvsync
592Basic \fBpreadv\fR\|(2) or \fBpwritev\fR\|(2) I/O.
593.TP
594.B pvsync2
595Basic \fBpreadv2\fR\|(2) or \fBpwritev2\fR\|(2) I/O.
596.TP
597.B libaio
598Linux native asynchronous I/O. This ioengine defines engine specific options.
599.TP
600.B posixaio
601POSIX asynchronous I/O using \fBaio_read\fR\|(3) and \fBaio_write\fR\|(3).
602.TP
603.B solarisaio
604Solaris native asynchronous I/O.
605.TP
606.B windowsaio
607Windows native asynchronous I/O.
608.TP
609.B mmap
610File is memory mapped with \fBmmap\fR\|(2) and data copied using
611\fBmemcpy\fR\|(3).
612.TP
613.B splice
614\fBsplice\fR\|(2) is used to transfer the data and \fBvmsplice\fR\|(2) to
615transfer data from user-space to the kernel.
616.TP
617.B syslet-rw
618Use the syslet system calls to make regular read/write asynchronous.
619.TP
620.B sg
621SCSI generic sg v3 I/O. May be either synchronous using the SG_IO ioctl, or if
622the target is an sg character device, we use \fBread\fR\|(2) and
623\fBwrite\fR\|(2) for asynchronous I/O.
624.TP
625.B null
626Doesn't transfer any data, just pretends to. Mainly used to exercise \fBfio\fR
627itself and for debugging and testing purposes.
628.TP
629.B net
630Transfer over the network. The protocol to be used can be defined with the
631\fBprotocol\fR parameter. Depending on the protocol, \fBfilename\fR,
632\fBhostname\fR, \fBport\fR, or \fBlisten\fR must be specified.
633This ioengine defines engine specific options.
634.TP
635.B netsplice
636Like \fBnet\fR, but uses \fBsplice\fR\|(2) and \fBvmsplice\fR\|(2) to map data
637and send/receive. This ioengine defines engine specific options.
638.TP
639.B cpuio
640Doesn't transfer any data, but burns CPU cycles according to \fBcpuload\fR and
641\fBcpucycles\fR parameters.
642.TP
643.B guasi
644The GUASI I/O engine is the Generic Userspace Asynchronous Syscall Interface
645approach to asynchronous I/O.
646.br
647See <http://www.xmailserver.org/guasi\-lib.html>.
648.TP
649.B rdma
650The RDMA I/O engine supports both RDMA memory semantics (RDMA_WRITE/RDMA_READ)
651and channel semantics (Send/Recv) for the InfiniBand, RoCE and iWARP protocols.
652.TP
653.B external
654Loads an external I/O engine object file. Append the engine filename as
655`:\fIenginepath\fR'.
656.TP
657.B falloc
658 IO engine that does regular linux native fallocate call to simulate data
659transfer as fio ioengine
660.br
661 DDIR_READ does fallocate(,mode = FALLOC_FL_KEEP_SIZE,)
662.br
663 DIR_WRITE does fallocate(,mode = 0)
664.br
665 DDIR_TRIM does fallocate(,mode = FALLOC_FL_KEEP_SIZE|FALLOC_FL_PUNCH_HOLE)
666.TP
667.B e4defrag
668IO engine that does regular EXT4_IOC_MOVE_EXT ioctls to simulate defragment activity
669request to DDIR_WRITE event
670.TP
671.B rbd
672IO engine supporting direct access to Ceph Rados Block Devices (RBD) via librbd
673without the need to use the kernel rbd driver. This ioengine defines engine specific
674options.
675.TP
676.B gfapi
677Using Glusterfs libgfapi sync interface to direct access to Glusterfs volumes without
678having to go through FUSE. This ioengine defines engine specific
679options.
680.TP
681.B gfapi_async
682Using Glusterfs libgfapi async interface to direct access to Glusterfs volumes without
683having to go through FUSE. This ioengine defines engine specific
684options.
685.TP
686.B libhdfs
687Read and write through Hadoop (HDFS). The \fBfilename\fR option is used to
688specify host,port of the hdfs name-node to connect. This engine interprets
689offsets a little differently. In HDFS, files once created cannot be modified.
690So random writes are not possible. To imitate this, libhdfs engine expects
691bunch of small files to be created over HDFS, and engine will randomly pick a
692file out of those files based on the offset generated by fio backend. (see the
693example job file to create such files, use rw=write option). Please note, you
694might want to set necessary environment variables to work with hdfs/libhdfs
695properly.
696.TP
697.B mtd
698Read, write and erase an MTD character device (e.g., /dev/mtd0). Discards are
699treated as erases. Depending on the underlying device type, the I/O may have
700to go in a certain pattern, e.g., on NAND, writing sequentially to erase blocks
701and discarding before overwriting. The writetrim mode works well for this
702constraint.
703.RE
704.P
705.RE
706.TP
707.BI iodepth \fR=\fPint
708Number of I/O units to keep in flight against the file. Note that increasing
709iodepth beyond 1 will not affect synchronous ioengines (except for small
710degress when verify_async is in use). Even async engines may impose OS
711restrictions causing the desired depth not to be achieved. This may happen on
712Linux when using libaio and not setting \fBdirect\fR=1, since buffered IO is
713not async on that OS. Keep an eye on the IO depth distribution in the
714fio output to verify that the achieved depth is as expected. Default: 1.
715.TP
716.BI iodepth_batch \fR=\fPint "\fR,\fP iodepth_batch_submit" \fR=\fPint
717This defines how many pieces of IO to submit at once. It defaults to 1
718which means that we submit each IO as soon as it is available, but can
719be raised to submit bigger batches of IO at the time. If it is set to 0
720the \fBiodepth\fR value will be used.
721.TP
722.BI iodepth_batch_complete_min \fR=\fPint "\fR,\fP iodepth_batch_complete" \fR=\fPint
723This defines how many pieces of IO to retrieve at once. It defaults to 1 which
724 means that we'll ask for a minimum of 1 IO in the retrieval process from the
725kernel. The IO retrieval will go on until we hit the limit set by
726\fBiodepth_low\fR. If this variable is set to 0, then fio will always check for
727completed events before queuing more IO. This helps reduce IO latency, at the
728cost of more retrieval system calls.
729.TP
730.BI iodepth_batch_complete_max \fR=\fPint
731This defines maximum pieces of IO to
732retrieve at once. This variable should be used along with
733\fBiodepth_batch_complete_min\fR=int variable, specifying the range
734of min and max amount of IO which should be retrieved. By default
735it is equal to \fBiodepth_batch_complete_min\fR value.
736
737Example #1:
738.RS
739.RS
740\fBiodepth_batch_complete_min\fR=1
741.LP
742\fBiodepth_batch_complete_max\fR=<iodepth>
743.RE
744
745which means that we will retrieve at leat 1 IO and up to the
746whole submitted queue depth. If none of IO has been completed
747yet, we will wait.
748
749Example #2:
750.RS
751\fBiodepth_batch_complete_min\fR=0
752.LP
753\fBiodepth_batch_complete_max\fR=<iodepth>
754.RE
755
756which means that we can retrieve up to the whole submitted
757queue depth, but if none of IO has been completed yet, we will
758NOT wait and immediately exit the system call. In this example
759we simply do polling.
760.RE
761.TP
762.BI iodepth_low \fR=\fPint
763Low watermark indicating when to start filling the queue again. Default:
764\fBiodepth\fR.
765.TP
766.BI io_submit_mode \fR=\fPstr
767This option controls how fio submits the IO to the IO engine. The default is
768\fBinline\fR, which means that the fio job threads submit and reap IO directly.
769If set to \fBoffload\fR, the job threads will offload IO submission to a
770dedicated pool of IO threads. This requires some coordination and thus has a
771bit of extra overhead, especially for lower queue depth IO where it can
772increase latencies. The benefit is that fio can manage submission rates
773independently of the device completion rates. This avoids skewed latency
774reporting if IO gets back up on the device side (the coordinated omission
775problem).
776.TP
777.BI direct \fR=\fPbool
778If true, use non-buffered I/O (usually O_DIRECT). Default: false.
779.TP
780.BI atomic \fR=\fPbool
781If value is true, attempt to use atomic direct IO. Atomic writes are guaranteed
782to be stable once acknowledged by the operating system. Only Linux supports
783O_ATOMIC right now.
784.TP
785.BI buffered \fR=\fPbool
786If true, use buffered I/O. This is the opposite of the \fBdirect\fR parameter.
787Default: true.
788.TP
789.BI offset \fR=\fPint
790Offset in the file to start I/O. Data before the offset will not be touched.
791.TP
792.BI offset_increment \fR=\fPint
793If this is provided, then the real offset becomes the
794offset + offset_increment * thread_number, where the thread number is a
795counter that starts at 0 and is incremented for each sub-job (i.e. when
796numjobs option is specified). This option is useful if there are several jobs
797which are intended to operate on a file in parallel disjoint segments, with
798even spacing between the starting points.
799.TP
800.BI number_ios \fR=\fPint
801Fio will normally perform IOs until it has exhausted the size of the region
802set by \fBsize\fR, or if it exhaust the allocated time (or hits an error
803condition). With this setting, the range/size can be set independently of
804the number of IOs to perform. When fio reaches this number, it will exit
805normally and report status. Note that this does not extend the amount
806of IO that will be done, it will only stop fio if this condition is met
807before other end-of-job criteria.
808.TP
809.BI fsync \fR=\fPint
810How many I/Os to perform before issuing an \fBfsync\fR\|(2) of dirty data. If
8110, don't sync. Default: 0.
812.TP
813.BI fdatasync \fR=\fPint
814Like \fBfsync\fR, but uses \fBfdatasync\fR\|(2) instead to only sync the
815data parts of the file. Default: 0.
816.TP
817.BI write_barrier \fR=\fPint
818Make every Nth write a barrier write.
819.TP
820.BI sync_file_range \fR=\fPstr:int
821Use \fBsync_file_range\fR\|(2) for every \fRval\fP number of write operations. Fio will
822track range of writes that have happened since the last \fBsync_file_range\fR\|(2) call.
823\fRstr\fP can currently be one or more of:
824.RS
825.TP
826.B wait_before
827SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE
828.TP
829.B write
830SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE
831.TP
832.B wait_after
833SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE
834.TP
835.RE
836.P
837So if you do sync_file_range=wait_before,write:8, fio would use
838\fBSYNC_FILE_RANGE_WAIT_BEFORE | SYNC_FILE_RANGE_WRITE\fP for every 8 writes.
839Also see the \fBsync_file_range\fR\|(2) man page. This option is Linux specific.
840.TP
841.BI overwrite \fR=\fPbool
842If writing, setup the file first and do overwrites. Default: false.
843.TP
844.BI end_fsync \fR=\fPbool
845Sync file contents when a write stage has completed. Default: false.
846.TP
847.BI fsync_on_close \fR=\fPbool
848If true, sync file contents on close. This differs from \fBend_fsync\fR in that
849it will happen on every close, not just at the end of the job. Default: false.
850.TP
851.BI rwmixread \fR=\fPint
852Percentage of a mixed workload that should be reads. Default: 50.
853.TP
854.BI rwmixwrite \fR=\fPint
855Percentage of a mixed workload that should be writes. If \fBrwmixread\fR and
856\fBrwmixwrite\fR are given and do not sum to 100%, the latter of the two
857overrides the first. This may interfere with a given rate setting, if fio is
858asked to limit reads or writes to a certain rate. If that is the case, then
859the distribution may be skewed. Default: 50.
860.TP
861.BI random_distribution \fR=\fPstr:float
862By default, fio will use a completely uniform random distribution when asked
863to perform random IO. Sometimes it is useful to skew the distribution in
864specific ways, ensuring that some parts of the data is more hot than others.
865Fio includes the following distribution models:
866.RS
867.TP
868.B random
869Uniform random distribution
870.TP
871.B zipf
872Zipf distribution
873.TP
874.B pareto
875Pareto distribution
876.TP
877.B gauss
878Normal (gaussian) distribution
879.TP
880.B zoned
881Zoned random distribution
882.TP
883.RE
884When using a \fBzipf\fR or \fBpareto\fR distribution, an input value is also
885needed to define the access pattern. For \fBzipf\fR, this is the zipf theta.
886For \fBpareto\fR, it's the pareto power. Fio includes a test program, genzipf,
887that can be used visualize what the given input values will yield in terms of
888hit rates. If you wanted to use \fBzipf\fR with a theta of 1.2, you would use
889random_distribution=zipf:1.2 as the option. If a non-uniform model is used,
890fio will disable use of the random map. For the \fBgauss\fR distribution, a
891normal deviation is supplied as a value between 0 and 100.
892.P
893.RS
894For a \fBzoned\fR distribution, fio supports specifying percentages of IO
895access that should fall within what range of the file or device. For example,
896given a criteria of:
897.P
898.RS
89960% of accesses should be to the first 10%
900.RE
901.RS
90230% of accesses should be to the next 20%
903.RE
904.RS
9058% of accesses should be to to the next 30%
906.RE
907.RS
9082% of accesses should be to the next 40%
909.RE
910.P
911we can define that through zoning of the random accesses. For the above
912example, the user would do:
913.P
914.RS
915.B random_distribution=zoned:60/10:30/20:8/30:2/40
916.RE
917.P
918similarly to how \fBbssplit\fR works for setting ranges and percentages of block
919sizes. Like \fBbssplit\fR, it's possible to specify separate zones for reads,
920writes, and trims. If just one set is given, it'll apply to all of them.
921.RE
922.TP
923.BI percentage_random \fR=\fPint
924For a random workload, set how big a percentage should be random. This defaults
925to 100%, in which case the workload is fully random. It can be set from
926anywhere from 0 to 100. Setting it to 0 would make the workload fully
927sequential. It is possible to set different values for reads, writes, and
928trim. To do so, simply use a comma separated list. See \fBblocksize\fR.
929.TP
930.B norandommap
931Normally \fBfio\fR will cover every block of the file when doing random I/O. If
932this parameter is given, a new offset will be chosen without looking at past
933I/O history. This parameter is mutually exclusive with \fBverify\fR.
934.TP
935.BI softrandommap \fR=\fPbool
936See \fBnorandommap\fR. If fio runs with the random block map enabled and it
937fails to allocate the map, if this option is set it will continue without a
938random block map. As coverage will not be as complete as with random maps, this
939option is disabled by default.
940.TP
941.BI random_generator \fR=\fPstr
942Fio supports the following engines for generating IO offsets for random IO:
943.RS
944.TP
945.B tausworthe
946Strong 2^88 cycle random number generator
947.TP
948.B lfsr
949Linear feedback shift register generator
950.TP
951.B tausworthe64
952Strong 64-bit 2^258 cycle random number generator
953.TP
954.RE
955.P
956Tausworthe is a strong random number generator, but it requires tracking on the
957side if we want to ensure that blocks are only read or written once. LFSR
958guarantees that we never generate the same offset twice, and it's also less
959computationally expensive. It's not a true random generator, however, though
960for IO purposes it's typically good enough. LFSR only works with single block
961sizes, not with workloads that use multiple block sizes. If used with such a
962workload, fio may read or write some blocks multiple times. The default
963value is tausworthe, unless the required space exceeds 2^32 blocks. If it does,
964then tausworthe64 is selected automatically.
965.TP
966.BI nice \fR=\fPint
967Run job with given nice value. See \fBnice\fR\|(2).
968.TP
969.BI prio \fR=\fPint
970Set I/O priority value of this job between 0 (highest) and 7 (lowest). See
971\fBionice\fR\|(1).
972.TP
973.BI prioclass \fR=\fPint
974Set I/O priority class. See \fBionice\fR\|(1).
975.TP
976.BI thinktime \fR=\fPint
977Stall job for given number of microseconds between issuing I/Os.
978.TP
979.BI thinktime_spin \fR=\fPint
980Pretend to spend CPU time for given number of microseconds, sleeping the rest
981of the time specified by \fBthinktime\fR. Only valid if \fBthinktime\fR is set.
982.TP
983.BI thinktime_blocks \fR=\fPint
984Only valid if thinktime is set - control how many blocks to issue, before
985waiting \fBthinktime\fR microseconds. If not set, defaults to 1 which will
986make fio wait \fBthinktime\fR microseconds after every block. This
987effectively makes any queue depth setting redundant, since no more than 1 IO
988will be queued before we have to complete it and do our thinktime. In other
989words, this setting effectively caps the queue depth if the latter is larger.
990Default: 1.
991.TP
992.BI rate \fR=\fPint
993Cap bandwidth used by this job. The number is in bytes/sec, the normal postfix
994rules apply. You can use \fBrate\fR=500k to limit reads and writes to 500k each,
995or you can specify read and writes separately. Using \fBrate\fR=1m,500k would
996limit reads to 1MB/sec and writes to 500KB/sec. Capping only reads or writes
997can be done with \fBrate\fR=,500k or \fBrate\fR=500k,. The former will only
998limit writes (to 500KB/sec), the latter will only limit reads.
999.TP
1000.BI rate_min \fR=\fPint
1001Tell \fBfio\fR to do whatever it can to maintain at least the given bandwidth.
1002Failing to meet this requirement will cause the job to exit. The same format
1003as \fBrate\fR is used for read vs write separation.
1004.TP
1005.BI rate_iops \fR=\fPint
1006Cap the bandwidth to this number of IOPS. Basically the same as rate, just
1007specified independently of bandwidth. The same format as \fBrate\fR is used for
1008read vs write separation. If \fBblocksize\fR is a range, the smallest block
1009size is used as the metric.
1010.TP
1011.BI rate_iops_min \fR=\fPint
1012If this rate of I/O is not met, the job will exit. The same format as \fBrate\fR
1013is used for read vs write separation.
1014.TP
1015.BI rate_process \fR=\fPstr
1016This option controls how fio manages rated IO submissions. The default is
1017\fBlinear\fR, which submits IO in a linear fashion with fixed delays between
1018IOs that gets adjusted based on IO completion rates. If this is set to
1019\fBpoisson\fR, fio will submit IO based on a more real world random request
1020flow, known as the Poisson process
1021(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisson_process). The lambda will be
102210^6 / IOPS for the given workload.
1023.TP
1024.BI rate_cycle \fR=\fPint
1025Average bandwidth for \fBrate\fR and \fBrate_min\fR over this number of
1026milliseconds. Default: 1000ms.
1027.TP
1028.BI latency_target \fR=\fPint
1029If set, fio will attempt to find the max performance point that the given
1030workload will run at while maintaining a latency below this target. The
1031values is given in microseconds. See \fBlatency_window\fR and
1032\fBlatency_percentile\fR.
1033.TP
1034.BI latency_window \fR=\fPint
1035Used with \fBlatency_target\fR to specify the sample window that the job
1036is run at varying queue depths to test the performance. The value is given
1037in microseconds.
1038.TP
1039.BI latency_percentile \fR=\fPfloat
1040The percentage of IOs that must fall within the criteria specified by
1041\fBlatency_target\fR and \fBlatency_window\fR. If not set, this defaults
1042to 100.0, meaning that all IOs must be equal or below to the value set
1043by \fBlatency_target\fR.
1044.TP
1045.BI max_latency \fR=\fPint
1046If set, fio will exit the job if it exceeds this maximum latency. It will exit
1047with an ETIME error.
1048.TP
1049.BI cpumask \fR=\fPint
1050Set CPU affinity for this job. \fIint\fR is a bitmask of allowed CPUs the job
1051may run on. See \fBsched_setaffinity\fR\|(2).
1052.TP
1053.BI cpus_allowed \fR=\fPstr
1054Same as \fBcpumask\fR, but allows a comma-delimited list of CPU numbers.
1055.TP
1056.BI cpus_allowed_policy \fR=\fPstr
1057Set the policy of how fio distributes the CPUs specified by \fBcpus_allowed\fR
1058or \fBcpumask\fR. Two policies are supported:
1059.RS
1060.RS
1061.TP
1062.B shared
1063All jobs will share the CPU set specified.
1064.TP
1065.B split
1066Each job will get a unique CPU from the CPU set.
1067.RE
1068.P
1069\fBshared\fR is the default behaviour, if the option isn't specified. If
1070\fBsplit\fR is specified, then fio will assign one cpu per job. If not enough
1071CPUs are given for the jobs listed, then fio will roundrobin the CPUs in
1072the set.
1073.RE
1074.P
1075.TP
1076.BI numa_cpu_nodes \fR=\fPstr
1077Set this job running on specified NUMA nodes' CPUs. The arguments allow
1078comma delimited list of cpu numbers, A-B ranges, or 'all'.
1079.TP
1080.BI numa_mem_policy \fR=\fPstr
1081Set this job's memory policy and corresponding NUMA nodes. Format of
1082the arguments:
1083.RS
1084.TP
1085.B <mode>[:<nodelist>]
1086.TP
1087.B mode
1088is one of the following memory policy:
1089.TP
1090.B default, prefer, bind, interleave, local
1091.TP
1092.RE
1093For \fBdefault\fR and \fBlocal\fR memory policy, no \fBnodelist\fR is
1094needed to be specified. For \fBprefer\fR, only one node is
1095allowed. For \fBbind\fR and \fBinterleave\fR, \fBnodelist\fR allows
1096comma delimited list of numbers, A-B ranges, or 'all'.
1097.TP
1098.BI startdelay \fR=\fPirange
1099Delay start of job for the specified number of seconds. Supports all time
1100suffixes to allow specification of hours, minutes, seconds and
1101milliseconds - seconds are the default if a unit is omitted.
1102Can be given as a range which causes each thread to choose randomly out of the
1103range.
1104.TP
1105.BI runtime \fR=\fPint
1106Terminate processing after the specified number of seconds.
1107.TP
1108.B time_based
1109If given, run for the specified \fBruntime\fR duration even if the files are
1110completely read or written. The same workload will be repeated as many times
1111as \fBruntime\fR allows.
1112.TP
1113.BI ramp_time \fR=\fPint
1114If set, fio will run the specified workload for this amount of time before
1115logging any performance numbers. Useful for letting performance settle before
1116logging results, thus minimizing the runtime required for stable results. Note
1117that the \fBramp_time\fR is considered lead in time for a job, thus it will
1118increase the total runtime if a special timeout or runtime is specified.
1119.TP
1120.BI invalidate \fR=\fPbool
1121Invalidate buffer-cache for the file prior to starting I/O. Default: true.
1122.TP
1123.BI sync \fR=\fPbool
1124Use synchronous I/O for buffered writes. For the majority of I/O engines,
1125this means using O_SYNC. Default: false.
1126.TP
1127.BI iomem \fR=\fPstr "\fR,\fP mem" \fR=\fPstr
1128Allocation method for I/O unit buffer. Allowed values are:
1129.RS
1130.RS
1131.TP
1132.B malloc
1133Allocate memory with \fBmalloc\fR\|(3).
1134.TP
1135.B shm
1136Use shared memory buffers allocated through \fBshmget\fR\|(2).
1137.TP
1138.B shmhuge
1139Same as \fBshm\fR, but use huge pages as backing.
1140.TP
1141.B mmap
1142Use \fBmmap\fR\|(2) for allocation. Uses anonymous memory unless a filename
1143is given after the option in the format `:\fIfile\fR'.
1144.TP
1145.B mmaphuge
1146Same as \fBmmap\fR, but use huge files as backing.
1147.TP
1148.B mmapshared
1149Same as \fBmmap\fR, but use a MMAP_SHARED mapping.
1150.RE
1151.P
1152The amount of memory allocated is the maximum allowed \fBblocksize\fR for the
1153job multiplied by \fBiodepth\fR. For \fBshmhuge\fR or \fBmmaphuge\fR to work,
1154the system must have free huge pages allocated. \fBmmaphuge\fR also needs to
1155have hugetlbfs mounted, and \fIfile\fR must point there. At least on Linux,
1156huge pages must be manually allocated. See \fB/proc/sys/vm/nr_hugehages\fR
1157and the documentation for that. Normally you just need to echo an appropriate
1158number, eg echoing 8 will ensure that the OS has 8 huge pages ready for
1159use.
1160.RE
1161.TP
1162.BI iomem_align \fR=\fPint "\fR,\fP mem_align" \fR=\fPint
1163This indicates the memory alignment of the IO memory buffers. Note that the
1164given alignment is applied to the first IO unit buffer, if using \fBiodepth\fR
1165the alignment of the following buffers are given by the \fBbs\fR used. In
1166other words, if using a \fBbs\fR that is a multiple of the page sized in the
1167system, all buffers will be aligned to this value. If using a \fBbs\fR that
1168is not page aligned, the alignment of subsequent IO memory buffers is the
1169sum of the \fBiomem_align\fR and \fBbs\fR used.
1170.TP
1171.BI hugepage\-size \fR=\fPint
1172Defines the size of a huge page. Must be at least equal to the system setting.
1173Should be a multiple of 1MB. Default: 4MB.
1174.TP
1175.B exitall
1176Terminate all jobs when one finishes. Default: wait for each job to finish.
1177.TP
1178.B exitall_on_error \fR=\fPbool
1179Terminate all jobs if one job finishes in error. Default: wait for each job
1180to finish.
1181.TP
1182.BI bwavgtime \fR=\fPint
1183Average bandwidth calculations over the given time in milliseconds. If the job
1184also does bandwidth logging through \fBwrite_bw_log\fR, then the minimum of
1185this option and \fBlog_avg_msec\fR will be used. Default: 500ms.
1186.TP
1187.BI iopsavgtime \fR=\fPint
1188Average IOPS calculations over the given time in milliseconds. If the job
1189also does IOPS logging through \fBwrite_iops_log\fR, then the minimum of
1190this option and \fBlog_avg_msec\fR will be used. Default: 500ms.
1191.TP
1192.BI create_serialize \fR=\fPbool
1193If true, serialize file creation for the jobs. Default: true.
1194.TP
1195.BI create_fsync \fR=\fPbool
1196\fBfsync\fR\|(2) data file after creation. Default: true.
1197.TP
1198.BI create_on_open \fR=\fPbool
1199If true, the files are not created until they are opened for IO by the job.
1200.TP
1201.BI create_only \fR=\fPbool
1202If true, fio will only run the setup phase of the job. If files need to be
1203laid out or updated on disk, only that will be done. The actual job contents
1204are not executed.
1205.TP
1206.BI allow_file_create \fR=\fPbool
1207If true, fio is permitted to create files as part of its workload. This is
1208the default behavior. If this option is false, then fio will error out if the
1209files it needs to use don't already exist. Default: true.
1210.TP
1211.BI allow_mounted_write \fR=\fPbool
1212If this isn't set, fio will abort jobs that are destructive (eg that write)
1213to what appears to be a mounted device or partition. This should help catch
1214creating inadvertently destructive tests, not realizing that the test will
1215destroy data on the mounted file system. Default: false.
1216.TP
1217.BI pre_read \fR=\fPbool
1218If this is given, files will be pre-read into memory before starting the given
1219IO operation. This will also clear the \fR \fBinvalidate\fR flag, since it is
1220pointless to pre-read and then drop the cache. This will only work for IO
1221engines that are seekable, since they allow you to read the same data
1222multiple times. Thus it will not work on eg network or splice IO.
1223.TP
1224.BI unlink \fR=\fPbool
1225Unlink job files when done. Default: false.
1226.TP
1227.BI loops \fR=\fPint
1228Specifies the number of iterations (runs of the same workload) of this job.
1229Default: 1.
1230.TP
1231.BI verify_only \fR=\fPbool
1232Do not perform the specified workload, only verify data still matches previous
1233invocation of this workload. This option allows one to check data multiple
1234times at a later date without overwriting it. This option makes sense only for
1235workloads that write data, and does not support workloads with the
1236\fBtime_based\fR option set.
1237.TP
1238.BI do_verify \fR=\fPbool
1239Run the verify phase after a write phase. Only valid if \fBverify\fR is set.
1240Default: true.
1241.TP
1242.BI verify \fR=\fPstr
1243Method of verifying file contents after each iteration of the job. Each
1244verification method also implies verification of special header, which is
1245written to the beginning of each block. This header also includes meta
1246information, like offset of the block, block number, timestamp when block
1247was written, etc. \fBverify\fR=str can be combined with \fBverify_pattern\fR=str
1248option. The allowed values are:
1249.RS
1250.RS
1251.TP
1252.B md5 crc16 crc32 crc32c crc32c-intel crc64 crc7 sha256 sha512 sha1 xxhash
1253Store appropriate checksum in the header of each block. crc32c-intel is
1254hardware accelerated SSE4.2 driven, falls back to regular crc32c if
1255not supported by the system.
1256.TP
1257.B meta
1258This option is deprecated, since now meta information is included in generic
1259verification header and meta verification happens by default. For detailed
1260information see the description of the \fBverify\fR=str setting. This option
1261is kept because of compatibility's sake with old configurations. Do not use it.
1262.TP
1263.B pattern
1264Verify a strict pattern. Normally fio includes a header with some basic
1265information and checksumming, but if this option is set, only the
1266specific pattern set with \fBverify_pattern\fR is verified.
1267.TP
1268.B null
1269Pretend to verify. Used for testing internals.
1270.RE
1271
1272This option can be used for repeated burn-in tests of a system to make sure
1273that the written data is also correctly read back. If the data direction given
1274is a read or random read, fio will assume that it should verify a previously
1275written file. If the data direction includes any form of write, the verify will
1276be of the newly written data.
1277.RE
1278.TP
1279.BI verifysort \fR=\fPbool
1280If true, written verify blocks are sorted if \fBfio\fR deems it to be faster to
1281read them back in a sorted manner. Default: true.
1282.TP
1283.BI verifysort_nr \fR=\fPint
1284Pre-load and sort verify blocks for a read workload.
1285.TP
1286.BI verify_offset \fR=\fPint
1287Swap the verification header with data somewhere else in the block before
1288writing. It is swapped back before verifying.
1289.TP
1290.BI verify_interval \fR=\fPint
1291Write the verification header for this number of bytes, which should divide
1292\fBblocksize\fR. Default: \fBblocksize\fR.
1293.TP
1294.BI verify_pattern \fR=\fPstr
1295If set, fio will fill the io buffers with this pattern. Fio defaults to filling
1296with totally random bytes, but sometimes it's interesting to fill with a known
1297pattern for io verification purposes. Depending on the width of the pattern,
1298fio will fill 1/2/3/4 bytes of the buffer at the time(it can be either a
1299decimal or a hex number). The verify_pattern if larger than a 32-bit quantity
1300has to be a hex number that starts with either "0x" or "0X". Use with
1301\fBverify\fP=str. Also, verify_pattern supports %o format, which means that for
1302each block offset will be written and then verifyied back, e.g.:
1303.RS
1304.RS
1305\fBverify_pattern\fR=%o
1306.RE
1307Or use combination of everything:
1308.LP
1309.RS
1310\fBverify_pattern\fR=0xff%o"abcd"-21
1311.RE
1312.RE
1313.TP
1314.BI verify_fatal \fR=\fPbool
1315If true, exit the job on the first observed verification failure. Default:
1316false.
1317.TP
1318.BI verify_dump \fR=\fPbool
1319If set, dump the contents of both the original data block and the data block we
1320read off disk to files. This allows later analysis to inspect just what kind of
1321data corruption occurred. Off by default.
1322.TP
1323.BI verify_async \fR=\fPint
1324Fio will normally verify IO inline from the submitting thread. This option
1325takes an integer describing how many async offload threads to create for IO
1326verification instead, causing fio to offload the duty of verifying IO contents
1327to one or more separate threads. If using this offload option, even sync IO
1328engines can benefit from using an \fBiodepth\fR setting higher than 1, as it
1329allows them to have IO in flight while verifies are running.
1330.TP
1331.BI verify_async_cpus \fR=\fPstr
1332Tell fio to set the given CPU affinity on the async IO verification threads.
1333See \fBcpus_allowed\fP for the format used.
1334.TP
1335.BI verify_backlog \fR=\fPint
1336Fio will normally verify the written contents of a job that utilizes verify
1337once that job has completed. In other words, everything is written then
1338everything is read back and verified. You may want to verify continually
1339instead for a variety of reasons. Fio stores the meta data associated with an
1340IO block in memory, so for large verify workloads, quite a bit of memory would
1341be used up holding this meta data. If this option is enabled, fio will write
1342only N blocks before verifying these blocks.
1343.TP
1344.BI verify_backlog_batch \fR=\fPint
1345Control how many blocks fio will verify if verify_backlog is set. If not set,
1346will default to the value of \fBverify_backlog\fR (meaning the entire queue is
1347read back and verified). If \fBverify_backlog_batch\fR is less than
1348\fBverify_backlog\fR then not all blocks will be verified, if
1349\fBverify_backlog_batch\fR is larger than \fBverify_backlog\fR, some blocks
1350will be verified more than once.
1351.TP
1352.BI trim_percentage \fR=\fPint
1353Number of verify blocks to discard/trim.
1354.TP
1355.BI trim_verify_zero \fR=\fPbool
1356Verify that trim/discarded blocks are returned as zeroes.
1357.TP
1358.BI trim_backlog \fR=\fPint
1359Trim after this number of blocks are written.
1360.TP
1361.BI trim_backlog_batch \fR=\fPint
1362Trim this number of IO blocks.
1363.TP
1364.BI experimental_verify \fR=\fPbool
1365Enable experimental verification.
1366.TP
1367.BI verify_state_save \fR=\fPbool
1368When a job exits during the write phase of a verify workload, save its
1369current state. This allows fio to replay up until that point, if the
1370verify state is loaded for the verify read phase.
1371.TP
1372.BI verify_state_load \fR=\fPbool
1373If a verify termination trigger was used, fio stores the current write
1374state of each thread. This can be used at verification time so that fio
1375knows how far it should verify. Without this information, fio will run
1376a full verification pass, according to the settings in the job file used.
1377.TP
1378.B stonewall "\fR,\fP wait_for_previous"
1379Wait for preceding jobs in the job file to exit before starting this one.
1380\fBstonewall\fR implies \fBnew_group\fR.
1381.TP
1382.B new_group
1383Start a new reporting group. If not given, all jobs in a file will be part
1384of the same reporting group, unless separated by a stonewall.
1385.TP
1386.BI numjobs \fR=\fPint
1387Number of clones (processes/threads performing the same workload) of this job.
1388Default: 1.
1389.TP
1390.B group_reporting
1391If set, display per-group reports instead of per-job when \fBnumjobs\fR is
1392specified.
1393.TP
1394.B thread
1395Use threads created with \fBpthread_create\fR\|(3) instead of processes created
1396with \fBfork\fR\|(2).
1397.TP
1398.BI zonesize \fR=\fPint
1399Divide file into zones of the specified size in bytes. See \fBzoneskip\fR.
1400.TP
1401.BI zonerange \fR=\fPint
1402Give size of an IO zone. See \fBzoneskip\fR.
1403.TP
1404.BI zoneskip \fR=\fPint
1405Skip the specified number of bytes when \fBzonesize\fR bytes of data have been
1406read.
1407.TP
1408.BI write_iolog \fR=\fPstr
1409Write the issued I/O patterns to the specified file. Specify a separate file
1410for each job, otherwise the iologs will be interspersed and the file may be
1411corrupt.
1412.TP
1413.BI read_iolog \fR=\fPstr
1414Replay the I/O patterns contained in the specified file generated by
1415\fBwrite_iolog\fR, or may be a \fBblktrace\fR binary file.
1416.TP
1417.BI replay_no_stall \fR=\fPint
1418While replaying I/O patterns using \fBread_iolog\fR the default behavior
1419attempts to respect timing information between I/Os. Enabling
1420\fBreplay_no_stall\fR causes I/Os to be replayed as fast as possible while
1421still respecting ordering.
1422.TP
1423.BI replay_redirect \fR=\fPstr
1424While replaying I/O patterns using \fBread_iolog\fR the default behavior
1425is to replay the IOPS onto the major/minor device that each IOP was recorded
1426from. Setting \fBreplay_redirect\fR causes all IOPS to be replayed onto the
1427single specified device regardless of the device it was recorded from.
1428.TP
1429.BI replay_align \fR=\fPint
1430Force alignment of IO offsets and lengths in a trace to this power of 2 value.
1431.TP
1432.BI replay_scale \fR=\fPint
1433Scale sector offsets down by this factor when replaying traces.
1434.TP
1435.BI per_job_logs \fR=\fPbool
1436If set, this generates bw/clat/iops log with per file private filenames. If
1437not set, jobs with identical names will share the log filename. Default: true.
1438.TP
1439.BI write_bw_log \fR=\fPstr
1440If given, write a bandwidth log of the jobs in this job file. Can be used to
1441store data of the bandwidth of the jobs in their lifetime. The included
1442fio_generate_plots script uses gnuplot to turn these text files into nice
1443graphs. See \fBwrite_lat_log\fR for behaviour of given filename. For this
1444option, the postfix is _bw.x.log, where x is the index of the job (1..N,
1445where N is the number of jobs). If \fBper_job_logs\fR is false, then the
1446filename will not include the job index. See the \fBLOG FILE FORMATS\fR
1447section.
1448.TP
1449.BI write_lat_log \fR=\fPstr
1450Same as \fBwrite_bw_log\fR, but writes I/O completion latencies. If no
1451filename is given with this option, the default filename of
1452"jobname_type.x.log" is used, where x is the index of the job (1..N, where
1453N is the number of jobs). Even if the filename is given, fio will still
1454append the type of log. If \fBper_job_logs\fR is false, then the filename will
1455not include the job index. See the \fBLOG FILE FORMATS\fR section.
1456.TP
1457.BI write_iops_log \fR=\fPstr
1458Same as \fBwrite_bw_log\fR, but writes IOPS. If no filename is given with this
1459option, the default filename of "jobname_type.x.log" is used, where x is the
1460index of the job (1..N, where N is the number of jobs). Even if the filename
1461is given, fio will still append the type of log. If \fBper_job_logs\fR is false,
1462then the filename will not include the job index. See the \fBLOG FILE FORMATS\fR
1463section.
1464.TP
1465.BI log_avg_msec \fR=\fPint
1466By default, fio will log an entry in the iops, latency, or bw log for every
1467IO that completes. When writing to the disk log, that can quickly grow to a
1468very large size. Setting this option makes fio average the each log entry
1469over the specified period of time, reducing the resolution of the log. See
1470\fBlog_max_value\fR as well. Defaults to 0, logging all entries.
1471.TP
1472.BI log_max_value \fR=\fPbool
1473If \fBlog_avg_msec\fR is set, fio logs the average over that window. If you
1474instead want to log the maximum value, set this option to 1. Defaults to
14750, meaning that averaged values are logged.
1476.TP
1477.BI log_offset \fR=\fPbool
1478If this is set, the iolog options will include the byte offset for the IO
1479entry as well as the other data values.
1480.TP
1481.BI log_compression \fR=\fPint
1482If this is set, fio will compress the IO logs as it goes, to keep the memory
1483footprint lower. When a log reaches the specified size, that chunk is removed
1484and compressed in the background. Given that IO logs are fairly highly
1485compressible, this yields a nice memory savings for longer runs. The downside
1486is that the compression will consume some background CPU cycles, so it may
1487impact the run. This, however, is also true if the logging ends up consuming
1488most of the system memory. So pick your poison. The IO logs are saved
1489normally at the end of a run, by decompressing the chunks and storing them
1490in the specified log file. This feature depends on the availability of zlib.
1491.TP
1492.BI log_compression_cpus \fR=\fPstr
1493Define the set of CPUs that are allowed to handle online log compression
1494for the IO jobs. This can provide better isolation between performance
1495sensitive jobs, and background compression work.
1496.TP
1497.BI log_store_compressed \fR=\fPbool
1498If set, fio will store the log files in a compressed format. They can be
1499decompressed with fio, using the \fB\-\-inflate-log\fR command line parameter.
1500The files will be stored with a \fB\.fz\fR suffix.
1501.TP
1502.BI block_error_percentiles \fR=\fPbool
1503If set, record errors in trim block-sized units from writes and trims and output
1504a histogram of how many trims it took to get to errors, and what kind of error
1505was encountered.
1506.TP
1507.BI disable_lat \fR=\fPbool
1508Disable measurements of total latency numbers. Useful only for cutting
1509back the number of calls to \fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2), as that does impact performance at
1510really high IOPS rates. Note that to really get rid of a large amount of these
1511calls, this option must be used with disable_slat and disable_bw as well.
1512.TP
1513.BI disable_clat \fR=\fPbool
1514Disable measurements of completion latency numbers. See \fBdisable_lat\fR.
1515.TP
1516.BI disable_slat \fR=\fPbool
1517Disable measurements of submission latency numbers. See \fBdisable_lat\fR.
1518.TP
1519.BI disable_bw_measurement \fR=\fPbool
1520Disable measurements of throughput/bandwidth numbers. See \fBdisable_lat\fR.
1521.TP
1522.BI lockmem \fR=\fPint
1523Pin the specified amount of memory with \fBmlock\fR\|(2). Can be used to
1524simulate a smaller amount of memory. The amount specified is per worker.
1525.TP
1526.BI exec_prerun \fR=\fPstr
1527Before running the job, execute the specified command with \fBsystem\fR\|(3).
1528.RS
1529Output is redirected in a file called \fBjobname.prerun.txt\fR
1530.RE
1531.TP
1532.BI exec_postrun \fR=\fPstr
1533Same as \fBexec_prerun\fR, but the command is executed after the job completes.
1534.RS
1535Output is redirected in a file called \fBjobname.postrun.txt\fR
1536.RE
1537.TP
1538.BI ioscheduler \fR=\fPstr
1539Attempt to switch the device hosting the file to the specified I/O scheduler.
1540.TP
1541.BI disk_util \fR=\fPbool
1542Generate disk utilization statistics if the platform supports it. Default: true.
1543.TP
1544.BI clocksource \fR=\fPstr
1545Use the given clocksource as the base of timing. The supported options are:
1546.RS
1547.TP
1548.B gettimeofday
1549\fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2)
1550.TP
1551.B clock_gettime
1552\fBclock_gettime\fR\|(2)
1553.TP
1554.B cpu
1555Internal CPU clock source
1556.TP
1557.RE
1558.P
1559\fBcpu\fR is the preferred clocksource if it is reliable, as it is very fast
1560(and fio is heavy on time calls). Fio will automatically use this clocksource
1561if it's supported and considered reliable on the system it is running on,
1562unless another clocksource is specifically set. For x86/x86-64 CPUs, this
1563means supporting TSC Invariant.
1564.TP
1565.BI gtod_reduce \fR=\fPbool
1566Enable all of the \fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2) reducing options (disable_clat, disable_slat,
1567disable_bw) plus reduce precision of the timeout somewhat to really shrink the
1568\fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2) call count. With this option enabled, we only do about 0.4% of
1569the gtod() calls we would have done if all time keeping was enabled.
1570.TP
1571.BI gtod_cpu \fR=\fPint
1572Sometimes it's cheaper to dedicate a single thread of execution to just getting
1573the current time. Fio (and databases, for instance) are very intensive on
1574\fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2) calls. With this option, you can set one CPU aside for doing
1575nothing but logging current time to a shared memory location. Then the other
1576threads/processes that run IO workloads need only copy that segment, instead of
1577entering the kernel with a \fBgettimeofday\fR\|(2) call. The CPU set aside for doing
1578these time calls will be excluded from other uses. Fio will manually clear it
1579from the CPU mask of other jobs.
1580.TP
1581.BI ignore_error \fR=\fPstr
1582Sometimes you want to ignore some errors during test in that case you can specify
1583error list for each error type.
1584.br
1585ignore_error=READ_ERR_LIST,WRITE_ERR_LIST,VERIFY_ERR_LIST
1586.br
1587errors for given error type is separated with ':'.
1588Error may be symbol ('ENOSPC', 'ENOMEM') or an integer.
1589.br
1590Example: ignore_error=EAGAIN,ENOSPC:122 .
1591.br
1592This option will ignore EAGAIN from READ, and ENOSPC and 122(EDQUOT) from WRITE.
1593.TP
1594.BI error_dump \fR=\fPbool
1595If set dump every error even if it is non fatal, true by default. If disabled
1596only fatal error will be dumped
1597.TP
1598.BI profile \fR=\fPstr
1599Select a specific builtin performance test.
1600.TP
1601.BI cgroup \fR=\fPstr
1602Add job to this control group. If it doesn't exist, it will be created.
1603The system must have a mounted cgroup blkio mount point for this to work. If
1604your system doesn't have it mounted, you can do so with:
1605
1606# mount \-t cgroup \-o blkio none /cgroup
1607.TP
1608.BI cgroup_weight \fR=\fPint
1609Set the weight of the cgroup to this value. See the documentation that comes
1610with the kernel, allowed values are in the range of 100..1000.
1611.TP
1612.BI cgroup_nodelete \fR=\fPbool
1613Normally fio will delete the cgroups it has created after the job completion.
1614To override this behavior and to leave cgroups around after the job completion,
1615set cgroup_nodelete=1. This can be useful if one wants to inspect various
1616cgroup files after job completion. Default: false
1617.TP
1618.BI uid \fR=\fPint
1619Instead of running as the invoking user, set the user ID to this value before
1620the thread/process does any work.
1621.TP
1622.BI gid \fR=\fPint
1623Set group ID, see \fBuid\fR.
1624.TP
1625.BI unit_base \fR=\fPint
1626Base unit for reporting. Allowed values are:
1627.RS
1628.TP
1629.B 0
1630Use auto-detection (default).
1631.TP
1632.B 8
1633Byte based.
1634.TP
1635.B 1
1636Bit based.
1637.RE
1638.P
1639.TP
1640.BI flow_id \fR=\fPint
1641The ID of the flow. If not specified, it defaults to being a global flow. See
1642\fBflow\fR.
1643.TP
1644.BI flow \fR=\fPint
1645Weight in token-based flow control. If this value is used, then there is a
1646\fBflow counter\fR which is used to regulate the proportion of activity between
1647two or more jobs. fio attempts to keep this flow counter near zero. The
1648\fBflow\fR parameter stands for how much should be added or subtracted to the
1649flow counter on each iteration of the main I/O loop. That is, if one job has
1650\fBflow=8\fR and another job has \fBflow=-1\fR, then there will be a roughly
16511:8 ratio in how much one runs vs the other.
1652.TP
1653.BI flow_watermark \fR=\fPint
1654The maximum value that the absolute value of the flow counter is allowed to
1655reach before the job must wait for a lower value of the counter.
1656.TP
1657.BI flow_sleep \fR=\fPint
1658The period of time, in microseconds, to wait after the flow watermark has been
1659exceeded before retrying operations
1660.TP
1661.BI clat_percentiles \fR=\fPbool
1662Enable the reporting of percentiles of completion latencies.
1663.TP
1664.BI percentile_list \fR=\fPfloat_list
1665Overwrite the default list of percentiles for completion latencies and the
1666block error histogram. Each number is a floating number in the range (0,100],
1667and the maximum length of the list is 20. Use ':' to separate the
1668numbers. For example, \-\-percentile_list=99.5:99.9 will cause fio to
1669report the values of completion latency below which 99.5% and 99.9% of
1670the observed latencies fell, respectively.
1671.SS "Ioengine Parameters List"
1672Some parameters are only valid when a specific ioengine is in use. These are
1673used identically to normal parameters, with the caveat that when used on the
1674command line, they must come after the ioengine.
1675.TP
1676.BI (cpu)cpuload \fR=\fPint
1677Attempt to use the specified percentage of CPU cycles.
1678.TP
1679.BI (cpu)cpuchunks \fR=\fPint
1680Split the load into cycles of the given time. In microseconds.
1681.TP
1682.BI (cpu)exit_on_io_done \fR=\fPbool
1683Detect when IO threads are done, then exit.
1684.TP
1685.BI (libaio)userspace_reap
1686Normally, with the libaio engine in use, fio will use
1687the io_getevents system call to reap newly returned events.
1688With this flag turned on, the AIO ring will be read directly
1689from user-space to reap events. The reaping mode is only
1690enabled when polling for a minimum of 0 events (eg when
1691iodepth_batch_complete=0).
1692.TP
1693.BI (psyncv2)hipri
1694Set RWF_HIPRI on IO, indicating to the kernel that it's of
1695higher priority than normal.
1696.TP
1697.BI (net,netsplice)hostname \fR=\fPstr
1698The host name or IP address to use for TCP or UDP based IO.
1699If the job is a TCP listener or UDP reader, the hostname is not
1700used and must be omitted unless it is a valid UDP multicast address.
1701.TP
1702.BI (net,netsplice)port \fR=\fPint
1703The TCP or UDP port to bind to or connect to. If this is used with
1704\fBnumjobs\fR to spawn multiple instances of the same job type, then
1705this will be the starting port number since fio will use a range of ports.
1706.TP
1707.BI (net,netsplice)interface \fR=\fPstr
1708The IP address of the network interface used to send or receive UDP multicast
1709packets.
1710.TP
1711.BI (net,netsplice)ttl \fR=\fPint
1712Time-to-live value for outgoing UDP multicast packets. Default: 1
1713.TP
1714.BI (net,netsplice)nodelay \fR=\fPbool
1715Set TCP_NODELAY on TCP connections.
1716.TP
1717.BI (net,netsplice)protocol \fR=\fPstr "\fR,\fP proto" \fR=\fPstr
1718The network protocol to use. Accepted values are:
1719.RS
1720.RS
1721.TP
1722.B tcp
1723Transmission control protocol
1724.TP
1725.B tcpv6
1726Transmission control protocol V6
1727.TP
1728.B udp
1729User datagram protocol
1730.TP
1731.B udpv6
1732User datagram protocol V6
1733.TP
1734.B unix
1735UNIX domain socket
1736.RE
1737.P
1738When the protocol is TCP or UDP, the port must also be given,
1739as well as the hostname if the job is a TCP listener or UDP
1740reader. For unix sockets, the normal filename option should be
1741used and the port is invalid.
1742.RE
1743.TP
1744.BI (net,netsplice)listen
1745For TCP network connections, tell fio to listen for incoming
1746connections rather than initiating an outgoing connection. The
1747hostname must be omitted if this option is used.
1748.TP
1749.BI (net, pingpong) \fR=\fPbool
1750Normally a network writer will just continue writing data, and a network reader
1751will just consume packets. If pingpong=1 is set, a writer will send its normal
1752payload to the reader, then wait for the reader to send the same payload back.
1753This allows fio to measure network latencies. The submission and completion
1754latencies then measure local time spent sending or receiving, and the
1755completion latency measures how long it took for the other end to receive and
1756send back. For UDP multicast traffic pingpong=1 should only be set for a single
1757reader when multiple readers are listening to the same address.
1758.TP
1759.BI (net, window_size) \fR=\fPint
1760Set the desired socket buffer size for the connection.
1761.TP
1762.BI (net, mss) \fR=\fPint
1763Set the TCP maximum segment size (TCP_MAXSEG).
1764.TP
1765.BI (e4defrag,donorname) \fR=\fPstr
1766File will be used as a block donor (swap extents between files)
1767.TP
1768.BI (e4defrag,inplace) \fR=\fPint
1769Configure donor file block allocation strategy
1770.RS
1771.BI 0(default) :
1772Preallocate donor's file on init
1773.TP
1774.BI 1:
1775allocate space immediately inside defragment event, and free right after event
1776.RE
1777.TP
1778.BI (rbd)clustername \fR=\fPstr
1779Specifies the name of the ceph cluster.
1780.TP
1781.BI (rbd)rbdname \fR=\fPstr
1782Specifies the name of the RBD.
1783.TP
1784.BI (rbd)pool \fR=\fPstr
1785Specifies the name of the Ceph pool containing the RBD.
1786.TP
1787.BI (rbd)clientname \fR=\fPstr
1788Specifies the username (without the 'client.' prefix) used to access the Ceph
1789cluster. If the clustername is specified, the clientname shall be the full
1790type.id string. If no type. prefix is given, fio will add 'client.' by default.
1791.TP
1792.BI (mtd)skipbad \fR=\fPbool
1793Skip operations against known bad blocks.
1794.SH OUTPUT
1795While running, \fBfio\fR will display the status of the created jobs. For
1796example:
1797.RS
1798.P
1799Threads: 1: [_r] [24.8% done] [ 13509/ 8334 kb/s] [eta 00h:01m:31s]
1800.RE
1801.P
1802The characters in the first set of brackets denote the current status of each
1803threads. The possible values are:
1804.P
1805.PD 0
1806.RS
1807.TP
1808.B P
1809Setup but not started.
1810.TP
1811.B C
1812Thread created.
1813.TP
1814.B I
1815Initialized, waiting.
1816.TP
1817.B R
1818Running, doing sequential reads.
1819.TP
1820.B r
1821Running, doing random reads.
1822.TP
1823.B W
1824Running, doing sequential writes.
1825.TP
1826.B w
1827Running, doing random writes.
1828.TP
1829.B M
1830Running, doing mixed sequential reads/writes.
1831.TP
1832.B m
1833Running, doing mixed random reads/writes.
1834.TP
1835.B F
1836Running, currently waiting for \fBfsync\fR\|(2).
1837.TP
1838.B V
1839Running, verifying written data.
1840.TP
1841.B E
1842Exited, not reaped by main thread.
1843.TP
1844.B \-
1845Exited, thread reaped.
1846.RE
1847.PD
1848.P
1849The second set of brackets shows the estimated completion percentage of
1850the current group. The third set shows the read and write I/O rate,
1851respectively. Finally, the estimated run time of the job is displayed.
1852.P
1853When \fBfio\fR completes (or is interrupted by Ctrl-C), it will show data
1854for each thread, each group of threads, and each disk, in that order.
1855.P
1856Per-thread statistics first show the threads client number, group-id, and
1857error code. The remaining figures are as follows:
1858.RS
1859.TP
1860.B io
1861Number of megabytes of I/O performed.
1862.TP
1863.B bw
1864Average data rate (bandwidth).
1865.TP
1866.B runt
1867Threads run time.
1868.TP
1869.B slat
1870Submission latency minimum, maximum, average and standard deviation. This is
1871the time it took to submit the I/O.
1872.TP
1873.B clat
1874Completion latency minimum, maximum, average and standard deviation. This
1875is the time between submission and completion.
1876.TP
1877.B bw
1878Bandwidth minimum, maximum, percentage of aggregate bandwidth received, average
1879and standard deviation.
1880.TP
1881.B cpu
1882CPU usage statistics. Includes user and system time, number of context switches
1883this thread went through and number of major and minor page faults. The CPU
1884utilization numbers are averages for the jobs in that reporting group, while
1885the context and fault counters are summed.
1886.TP
1887.B IO depths
1888Distribution of I/O depths. Each depth includes everything less than (or equal)
1889to it, but greater than the previous depth.
1890.TP
1891.B IO issued
1892Number of read/write requests issued, and number of short read/write requests.
1893.TP
1894.B IO latencies
1895Distribution of I/O completion latencies. The numbers follow the same pattern
1896as \fBIO depths\fR.
1897.RE
1898.P
1899The group statistics show:
1900.PD 0
1901.RS
1902.TP
1903.B io
1904Number of megabytes I/O performed.
1905.TP
1906.B aggrb
1907Aggregate bandwidth of threads in the group.
1908.TP
1909.B minb
1910Minimum average bandwidth a thread saw.
1911.TP
1912.B maxb
1913Maximum average bandwidth a thread saw.
1914.TP
1915.B mint
1916Shortest runtime of threads in the group.
1917.TP
1918.B maxt
1919Longest runtime of threads in the group.
1920.RE
1921.PD
1922.P
1923Finally, disk statistics are printed with reads first:
1924.PD 0
1925.RS
1926.TP
1927.B ios
1928Number of I/Os performed by all groups.
1929.TP
1930.B merge
1931Number of merges in the I/O scheduler.
1932.TP
1933.B ticks
1934Number of ticks we kept the disk busy.
1935.TP
1936.B io_queue
1937Total time spent in the disk queue.
1938.TP
1939.B util
1940Disk utilization.
1941.RE
1942.PD
1943.P
1944It is also possible to get fio to dump the current output while it is
1945running, without terminating the job. To do that, send fio the \fBUSR1\fR
1946signal.
1947.SH TERSE OUTPUT
1948If the \fB\-\-minimal\fR / \fB\-\-append-terse\fR options are given, the
1949results will be printed/appended in a semicolon-delimited format suitable for
1950scripted use.
1951A job description (if provided) follows on a new line. Note that the first
1952number in the line is the version number. If the output has to be changed
1953for some reason, this number will be incremented by 1 to signify that
1954change. The fields are:
1955.P
1956.RS
1957.B terse version, fio version, jobname, groupid, error
1958.P
1959Read status:
1960.RS
1961.B Total I/O \fR(KB)\fP, bandwidth \fR(KB/s)\fP, IOPS, runtime \fR(ms)\fP
1962.P
1963Submission latency:
1964.RS
1965.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1966.RE
1967Completion latency:
1968.RS
1969.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1970.RE
1971Completion latency percentiles (20 fields):
1972.RS
1973.B Xth percentile=usec
1974.RE
1975Total latency:
1976.RS
1977.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1978.RE
1979Bandwidth:
1980.RS
1981.B min, max, aggregate percentage of total, mean, standard deviation
1982.RE
1983.RE
1984.P
1985Write status:
1986.RS
1987.B Total I/O \fR(KB)\fP, bandwidth \fR(KB/s)\fP, IOPS, runtime \fR(ms)\fP
1988.P
1989Submission latency:
1990.RS
1991.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1992.RE
1993Completion latency:
1994.RS
1995.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
1996.RE
1997Completion latency percentiles (20 fields):
1998.RS
1999.B Xth percentile=usec
2000.RE
2001Total latency:
2002.RS
2003.B min, max, mean, standard deviation
2004.RE
2005Bandwidth:
2006.RS
2007.B min, max, aggregate percentage of total, mean, standard deviation
2008.RE
2009.RE
2010.P
2011CPU usage:
2012.RS
2013.B user, system, context switches, major page faults, minor page faults
2014.RE
2015.P
2016IO depth distribution:
2017.RS
2018.B <=1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, >=64
2019.RE
2020.P
2021IO latency distribution:
2022.RS
2023Microseconds:
2024.RS
2025.B <=2, 4, 10, 20, 50, 100, 250, 500, 750, 1000
2026.RE
2027Milliseconds:
2028.RS
2029.B <=2, 4, 10, 20, 50, 100, 250, 500, 750, 1000, 2000, >=2000
2030.RE
2031.RE
2032.P
2033Disk utilization (1 for each disk used):
2034.RS
2035.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
2036.RE
2037.P
2038Error Info (dependent on continue_on_error, default off):
2039.RS
2040.B total # errors, first error code
2041.RE
2042.P
2043.B text description (if provided in config - appears on newline)
2044.RE
2045.SH TRACE FILE FORMAT
2046There are two trace file format that you can encounter. The older (v1) format
2047is unsupported since version 1.20-rc3 (March 2008). It will still be described
2048below in case that you get an old trace and want to understand it.
2049
2050In any case the trace is a simple text file with a single action per line.
2051
2052.P
2053.B Trace file format v1
2054.RS
2055Each line represents a single io action in the following format:
2056
2057rw, offset, length
2058
2059where rw=0/1 for read/write, and the offset and length entries being in bytes.
2060
2061This format is not supported in Fio versions => 1.20-rc3.
2062
2063.RE
2064.P
2065.B Trace file format v2
2066.RS
2067The second version of the trace file format was added in Fio version 1.17.
2068It allows to access more then one file per trace and has a bigger set of
2069possible file actions.
2070
2071The first line of the trace file has to be:
2072
2073\fBfio version 2 iolog\fR
2074
2075Following this can be lines in two different formats, which are described below.
2076The file management format:
2077
2078\fBfilename action\fR
2079
2080The filename is given as an absolute path. The action can be one of these:
2081
2082.P
2083.PD 0
2084.RS
2085.TP
2086.B add
2087Add the given filename to the trace
2088.TP
2089.B open
2090Open the file with the given filename. The filename has to have been previously
2091added with the \fBadd\fR action.
2092.TP
2093.B close
2094Close the file with the given filename. The file must have previously been
2095opened.
2096.RE
2097.PD
2098.P
2099
2100The file io action format:
2101
2102\fBfilename action offset length\fR
2103
2104The filename is given as an absolute path, and has to have been added and opened
2105before it can be used with this format. The offset and length are given in
2106bytes. The action can be one of these:
2107
2108.P
2109.PD 0
2110.RS
2111.TP
2112.B wait
2113Wait for 'offset' microseconds. Everything below 100 is discarded. The time is
2114relative to the previous wait statement.
2115.TP
2116.B read
2117Read \fBlength\fR bytes beginning from \fBoffset\fR
2118.TP
2119.B write
2120Write \fBlength\fR bytes beginning from \fBoffset\fR
2121.TP
2122.B sync
2123fsync() the file
2124.TP
2125.B datasync
2126fdatasync() the file
2127.TP
2128.B trim
2129trim the given file from the given \fBoffset\fR for \fBlength\fR bytes
2130.RE
2131.PD
2132.P
2133
2134.SH CPU IDLENESS PROFILING
2135In some cases, we want to understand CPU overhead in a test. For example,
2136we test patches for the specific goodness of whether they reduce CPU usage.
2137fio implements a balloon approach to create a thread per CPU that runs at
2138idle priority, meaning that it only runs when nobody else needs the cpu.
2139By measuring the amount of work completed by the thread, idleness of each
2140CPU can be derived accordingly.
2141
2142An unit work is defined as touching a full page of unsigned characters. Mean
2143and standard deviation of time to complete an unit work is reported in "unit
2144work" section. Options can be chosen to report detailed percpu idleness or
2145overall system idleness by aggregating percpu stats.
2146
2147.SH VERIFICATION AND TRIGGERS
2148Fio is usually run in one of two ways, when data verification is done. The
2149first is a normal write job of some sort with verify enabled. When the
2150write phase has completed, fio switches to reads and verifies everything
2151it wrote. The second model is running just the write phase, and then later
2152on running the same job (but with reads instead of writes) to repeat the
2153same IO patterns and verify the contents. Both of these methods depend
2154on the write phase being completed, as fio otherwise has no idea how much
2155data was written.
2156
2157With verification triggers, fio supports dumping the current write state
2158to local files. Then a subsequent read verify workload can load this state
2159and know exactly where to stop. This is useful for testing cases where
2160power is cut to a server in a managed fashion, for instance.
2161
2162A verification trigger consists of two things:
2163
2164.RS
2165Storing the write state of each job
2166.LP
2167Executing a trigger command
2168.RE
2169
2170The write state is relatively small, on the order of hundreds of bytes
2171to single kilobytes. It contains information on the number of completions
2172done, the last X completions, etc.
2173
2174A trigger is invoked either through creation (\fBtouch\fR) of a specified
2175file in the system, or through a timeout setting. If fio is run with
2176\fB\-\-trigger\-file=/tmp/trigger-file\fR, then it will continually check for
2177the existence of /tmp/trigger-file. When it sees this file, it will
2178fire off the trigger (thus saving state, and executing the trigger
2179command).
2180
2181For client/server runs, there's both a local and remote trigger. If
2182fio is running as a server backend, it will send the job states back
2183to the client for safe storage, then execute the remote trigger, if
2184specified. If a local trigger is specified, the server will still send
2185back the write state, but the client will then execute the trigger.
2186
2187.RE
2188.P
2189.B Verification trigger example
2190.RS
2191
2192Lets say we want to run a powercut test on the remote machine 'server'.
2193Our write workload is in write-test.fio. We want to cut power to 'server'
2194at some point during the run, and we'll run this test from the safety
2195or our local machine, 'localbox'. On the server, we'll start the fio
2196backend normally:
2197
2198server# \fBfio \-\-server\fR
2199
2200and on the client, we'll fire off the workload:
2201
2202localbox$ \fBfio \-\-client=server \-\-trigger\-file=/tmp/my\-trigger \-\-trigger-remote="bash \-c "echo b > /proc/sysrq-triger""\fR
2203
2204We set \fB/tmp/my-trigger\fR as the trigger file, and we tell fio to execute
2205
2206\fBecho b > /proc/sysrq-trigger\fR
2207
2208on the server once it has received the trigger and sent us the write
2209state. This will work, but it's not \fIreally\fR cutting power to the server,
2210it's merely abruptly rebooting it. If we have a remote way of cutting
2211power to the server through IPMI or similar, we could do that through
2212a local trigger command instead. Lets assume we have a script that does
2213IPMI reboot of a given hostname, ipmi-reboot. On localbox, we could
2214then have run fio with a local trigger instead:
2215
2216localbox$ \fBfio \-\-client=server \-\-trigger\-file=/tmp/my\-trigger \-\-trigger="ipmi-reboot server"\fR
2217
2218For this case, fio would wait for the server to send us the write state,
2219then execute 'ipmi-reboot server' when that happened.
2220
2221.RE
2222.P
2223.B Loading verify state
2224.RS
2225To load store write state, read verification job file must contain
2226the verify_state_load option. If that is set, fio will load the previously
2227stored state. For a local fio run this is done by loading the files directly,
2228and on a client/server run, the server backend will ask the client to send
2229the files over and load them from there.
2230
2231.RE
2232
2233.SH LOG FILE FORMATS
2234
2235Fio supports a variety of log file formats, for logging latencies, bandwidth,
2236and IOPS. The logs share a common format, which looks like this:
2237
2238.B time (msec), value, data direction, offset
2239
2240Time for the log entry is always in milliseconds. The value logged depends
2241on the type of log, it will be one of the following:
2242
2243.P
2244.PD 0
2245.TP
2246.B Latency log
2247Value is in latency in usecs
2248.TP
2249.B Bandwidth log
2250Value is in KB/sec
2251.TP
2252.B IOPS log
2253Value is in IOPS
2254.PD
2255.P
2256
2257Data direction is one of the following:
2258
2259.P
2260.PD 0
2261.TP
2262.B 0
2263IO is a READ
2264.TP
2265.B 1
2266IO is a WRITE
2267.TP
2268.B 2
2269IO is a TRIM
2270.PD
2271.P
2272
2273The \fIoffset\fR is the offset, in bytes, from the start of the file, for that
2274particular IO. The logging of the offset can be toggled with \fBlog_offset\fR.
2275
2276If windowed logging is enabled though \fBlog_avg_msec\fR, then fio doesn't log
2277individual IOs. Instead of logs the average values over the specified
2278period of time. Since \fIdata direction\fR and \fIoffset\fR are per-IO values,
2279they aren't applicable if windowed logging is enabled. If windowed logging
2280is enabled and \fBlog_max_value\fR is set, then fio logs maximum values in
2281that window instead of averages.
2282
2283.RE
2284
2285.SH CLIENT / SERVER
2286Normally you would run fio as a stand-alone application on the machine
2287where the IO workload should be generated. However, it is also possible to
2288run the frontend and backend of fio separately. This makes it possible to
2289have a fio server running on the machine(s) where the IO workload should
2290be running, while controlling it from another machine.
2291
2292To start the server, you would do:
2293
2294\fBfio \-\-server=args\fR
2295
2296on that machine, where args defines what fio listens to. The arguments
2297are of the form 'type:hostname or IP:port'. 'type' is either 'ip' (or ip4)
2298for TCP/IP v4, 'ip6' for TCP/IP v6, or 'sock' for a local unix domain
2299socket. 'hostname' is either a hostname or IP address, and 'port' is the port to
2300listen to (only valid for TCP/IP, not a local socket). Some examples:
2301
23021) \fBfio \-\-server\fR
2303
2304 Start a fio server, listening on all interfaces on the default port (8765).
2305
23062) \fBfio \-\-server=ip:hostname,4444\fR
2307
2308 Start a fio server, listening on IP belonging to hostname and on port 4444.
2309
23103) \fBfio \-\-server=ip6:::1,4444\fR
2311
2312 Start a fio server, listening on IPv6 localhost ::1 and on port 4444.
2313
23144) \fBfio \-\-server=,4444\fR
2315
2316 Start a fio server, listening on all interfaces on port 4444.
2317
23185) \fBfio \-\-server=1.2.3.4\fR
2319
2320 Start a fio server, listening on IP 1.2.3.4 on the default port.
2321
23226) \fBfio \-\-server=sock:/tmp/fio.sock\fR
2323
2324 Start a fio server, listening on the local socket /tmp/fio.sock.
2325
2326When a server is running, you can connect to it from a client. The client
2327is run with:
2328
2329\fBfio \-\-local-args \-\-client=server \-\-remote-args <job file(s)>\fR
2330
2331where \-\-local-args are arguments that are local to the client where it is
2332running, 'server' is the connect string, and \-\-remote-args and <job file(s)>
2333are sent to the server. The 'server' string follows the same format as it
2334does on the server side, to allow IP/hostname/socket and port strings.
2335You can connect to multiple clients as well, to do that you could run:
2336
2337\fBfio \-\-client=server2 \-\-client=server2 <job file(s)>\fR
2338
2339If the job file is located on the fio server, then you can tell the server
2340to load a local file as well. This is done by using \-\-remote-config:
2341
2342\fBfio \-\-client=server \-\-remote-config /path/to/file.fio\fR
2343
2344Then fio will open this local (to the server) job file instead
2345of being passed one from the client.
2346
2347If you have many servers (example: 100 VMs/containers), you can input a pathname
2348of a file containing host IPs/names as the parameter value for the \-\-client option.
2349For example, here is an example "host.list" file containing 2 hostnames:
2350
2351host1.your.dns.domain
2352.br
2353host2.your.dns.domain
2354
2355The fio command would then be:
2356
2357\fBfio \-\-client=host.list <job file>\fR
2358
2359In this mode, you cannot input server-specific parameters or job files, and all
2360servers receive the same job file.
2361
2362In order to enable fio \-\-client runs utilizing a shared filesystem from multiple hosts,
2363fio \-\-client now prepends the IP address of the server to the filename. For example,
2364if fio is using directory /mnt/nfs/fio and is writing filename fileio.tmp,
2365with a \-\-client hostfile
2366containing two hostnames h1 and h2 with IP addresses 192.168.10.120 and 192.168.10.121, then
2367fio will create two files:
2368
2369/mnt/nfs/fio/192.168.10.120.fileio.tmp
2370.br
2371/mnt/nfs/fio/192.168.10.121.fileio.tmp
2372
2373.SH AUTHORS
2374
2375.B fio
2376was written by Jens Axboe <jens.axboe@oracle.com>,
2377now Jens Axboe <axboe@fb.com>.
2378.br
2379This man page was written by Aaron Carroll <aaronc@cse.unsw.edu.au> based
2380on documentation by Jens Axboe.
2381.SH "REPORTING BUGS"
2382Report bugs to the \fBfio\fR mailing list <fio@vger.kernel.org>.
2383See \fBREADME\fR.
2384.SH "SEE ALSO"
2385For further documentation see \fBHOWTO\fR and \fBREADME\fR.
2386.br
2387Sample jobfiles are available in the \fBexamples\fR directory.