Add support for simple profile benchmarks

[fio.git] / README

diff --git a/README b/README
index dd3bab11a4937e68016fb0b934b9987d2b2eadc0..d5235de39a6ff7dfa32b9e055cbaac5974e7fc2a 100644 (file)
--- a/README
+++ b/README
@@ -141,9 +141,11 @@ always parsed and taken into account.
 
 Fio has an internal allocator for shared memory called smalloc. It
 allocates shared structures from this pool. The pool defaults to 1024k
-in size, and can grow to 32 pools. If running large jobs with randommap
+in size, and can grow to 128 pools. If running large jobs with randommap
 enabled it can run out of memory, in which case the --alloc-size switch
-is handy for starting with a larger pool size.
+is handy for starting with a larger pool size. The backing store is
+files in /tmp. Fio cleans up after itself, while it is running you
+may see .fio_smalloc.* files in /tmp.
 
 
 Job file
@@ -200,8 +202,8 @@ The job file parameters are:
                        also include k/m postfix.
        direct=x        1 for direct IO, 0 for buffered IO
        thinktime=x     "Think" x usec after each io
-       rate=x          Throttle rate to x KiB/sec
-       ratemin=x       Quit if rate of x KiB/sec can't be met
+       rate=x          Throttle rate to x KB/sec
+       ratemin=x       Quit if rate of x KB/sec can't be met
        ratecycle=x     ratemin averaged over x msecs
        cpumask=x       Only allow job to run on CPUs defined by mask.
        cpus_allowed=x  Like 'cpumask', but allow text setting of CPU affinity.
@@ -259,6 +261,33 @@ The job file parameters are:
        cpuchunks=x     Split burn cycles into pieces of x usecs.
 
 
+
+Platforms
+---------
+
+Fio works on (at least) Linux, Solaris, and FreeBSD. Some features and/or
+options may only be available on some of the platforms, typically because
+those features only apply to that platform (like the solarisaio engine, or
+the splice engine on Linux).
+
+Some features are not available on FreeBSD/Solaris even if they could be
+implemented, I'd be happy to take patches for that. An example of that is
+disk utility statistics and (I think) huge page support, support for that
+does exist in FreeBSD/Solaris.
+
+Fio uses pthread mutexes for signalling and locking and FreeBSD does not
+support process shared pthread mutexes. As a result, only threads are
+supported on FreeBSD. This could be fixed with sysv ipc locking or
+other locking alternatives.
+
+Other *BSD platforms are untested, but fio should work there almost out
+of the box. Since I don't do test runs or even compiles on those platforms,
+your mileage may vary. Sending me patches for other platforms is greatly
+appreciated. There's a lot of value in having the same test/benchmark tool
+available on all platforms.
+
+
+
 Author
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