Add option for refilling IO buffers on each submit

[fio.git] / HOWTO

diff --git a/HOWTO b/HOWTO
index 0d3d7759843b3b4bbbfa3375f1a7b73733e95930..36e42aaf6b9defb210d83d0b538284bea7f6a4d6 100644 (file)
--- a/HOWTO
+++ b/HOWTO
@@ -219,6 +219,25 @@ filename=str       Fio normally makes up a filename based on the job name,
 opendir=str    Tell fio to recursively add any file it can find in this
                directory and down the file system tree.
 
 opendir=str    Tell fio to recursively add any file it can find in this
                directory and down the file system tree.
 

+lockfile=str   Fio defaults to not doing any locking files before it does
+               IO to them. If a file or file descriptor is shared, fio
+               can serialize IO to that file to make the end result
+               consistent. This is usual for emulating real workloads that
+               share files. The lock modes are:
+
+                       none            No locking. The default.
+                       exclusive       Only one thread/process may do IO,
+                                       excluding all others.
+                       readwrite       Read-write locking on the file. Many
+                                       readers may access the file at the
+                                       same time, but writes get exclusive
+                                       access.
+
+               The option may be post-fixed with a lock batch number. If
+               set, then each thread/process may do that amount of IOs to
+               the file before giving up the lock. Since lock acqusition is
+               expensive, batching the lock/unlocks will speed up IO.
+

 readwrite=str
 rw=str         Type of io pattern. Accepted values are:
 
 readwrite=str
 rw=str         Type of io pattern. Accepted values are:
 


@@ -317,6 +336,11 @@ bs_unaligned       If this option is given, any byte size value within bsrange
 zero_buffers   If this option is given, fio will init the IO buffers to
                all zeroes. The default is to fill them with random data.
 
 zero_buffers   If this option is given, fio will init the IO buffers to
                all zeroes. The default is to fill them with random data.
 

+refill_buffers If this option is given, fio will refill the IO buffers
+               on every submit. The default is to only fill it at init
+               time and reuse that data. Only makes sense if zero_buffers
+               isn't specified, naturally.
+

 nrfiles=int    Number of files to use for this job. Defaults to 1.
 
 openfiles=int  Number of files to keep open at the same time. Defaults to
 nrfiles=int    Number of files to use for this job. Defaults to 1.
 
 openfiles=int  Number of files to keep open at the same time. Defaults to


@@ -383,7 +407,10 @@ ioengine=str       Defines how the job issues io to the file. The following
                                cycles according to the cpuload= and
                                cpucycle= options. Setting cpuload=85
                                will cause that job to do nothing but burn
                                cycles according to the cpuload= and
                                cpucycle= options. Setting cpuload=85
                                will cause that job to do nothing but burn

-                               85% of the CPU.
+                               85% of the CPU. In case of SMP machines,
+                               use numjobs=<no_of_cpu> to get desired CPU
+                               usage, as the cpuload only loads a single
+                               CPU at the desired rate.

 
                        guasi   The GUASI IO engine is the Generic Userspace
                                Asyncronous Syscall Interface approach
 
                        guasi   The GUASI IO engine is the Generic Userspace
                                Asyncronous Syscall Interface approach


@@ -432,7 +459,11 @@ fsync=int  If writing to a file, issue a sync of the dirty data
                not sync the file. The exception is the sg io engine, which
                synchronizes the disk cache anyway.
 
                not sync the file. The exception is the sg io engine, which
                synchronizes the disk cache anyway.
 

-overwrite=bool If writing to a file, setup the file first and do overwrites.
+overwrite=bool If true, writes to a file will always overwrite existing
+               data. If the file doesn't already exist, it will be
+               created before the write phase begins. If the file exists
+               and is large enough for the specified write phase, nothing
+               will be done.

 
 end_fsync=bool If true, fsync file contents when the job exits.
 
 
 end_fsync=bool If true, fsync file contents when the job exits.
 


@@ -440,10 +471,6 @@ fsync_on_close=bool        If true, fio will fsync() a dirty file on close.
                This differs from end_fsync in that it will happen on every
                file close, not just at the end of the job.
 
                This differs from end_fsync in that it will happen on every
                file close, not just at the end of the job.
 

-rwmixcycle=int Value in milliseconds describing how often to switch between
-               reads and writes for a mixed workload. The default is
-               500 msecs.
-

 rwmixread=int  How large a percentage of the mix should be reads.
 
 rwmixwrite=int How large a percentage of the mix should be writes. If both
 rwmixread=int  How large a percentage of the mix should be reads.
 
 rwmixwrite=int How large a percentage of the mix should be writes. If both


@@ -460,6 +487,12 @@ norandommap        Normally fio will cover every block of the file when doing
                fio doesn't track potential block rewrites which may alter
                the calculated checksum for that block.
 
                fio doesn't track potential block rewrites which may alter
                the calculated checksum for that block.
 

+softrandommap  See norandommap. If fio runs with the random block map enabled
+               and it fails to allocate the map, if this option is set it
+               will continue without a random block map. As coverage will
+               not be as complete as with random maps, this option is
+               disabled by default.
+

 nice=int       Run the job with the given nice value. See man nice(2).
 
 prio=int       Set the io priority value of this job. Linux limits us to
 nice=int       Run the job with the given nice value. See man nice(2).
 
 prio=int       Set the io priority value of this job. Linux limits us to