block sizes. The format of the option is bssplit=blocksize/percentage,
optionally adding as many definitions as needed seperated by a colon.
Example: bssplit=4k/10:64k/50:32k/40 would issue 50% 64k blocks, 10% 4k
-blocks and 40% 32k blocks.
+blocks and 40% 32k blocks. \fBbssplit\fR also supports giving separate
+splits to reads and writes. The format is identical to what the
+\fBbs\fR option accepts, the read and write parts are separated with a
+comma.
.TP
.B blocksize_unaligned\fR,\fP bs_unaligned
If set, any size in \fBblocksize_range\fR may be used. This typically won't
work with direct I/O, as that normally requires sector alignment.
.TP
+.BI blockalign \fR=\fPint[,int] "\fR,\fB ba" \fR=\fPint[,int]
+At what boundary to align random IO offsets. Defaults to the same as 'blocksize'
+the minimum blocksize given. Minimum alignment is typically 512b
+for using direct IO, though it usually depends on the hardware block size.
+This option is mutually exclusive with using a random map for files, so it
+will turn off that option.
+.TP
.B zero_buffers
Initialise buffers with all zeros. Default: fill buffers with random data.
.TP
+.B 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. If data verification is enabled,
+refill_buffers is also automatically enabled.
+.TP
.BI nrfiles \fR=\fPint
Number of files to use for this job. Default: 1.
.TP
.TP
.BI rwmixwrite \fR=\fPint
Percentage of a mixed workload that should be writes. If \fBrwmixread\fR and
-\fBwrmixwrite\fR are given and do not sum to 100%, the latter of the two
-overrides the first. Default: 50.
+\fBrwmixwrite\fR are given and do not sum to 100%, the latter of the two
+overrides the first. This may interfere with a given rate setting, if fio is
+asked to limit reads or writes to a certain rate. If that is the case, then
+the distribution may be skewed. Default: 50.
.TP
.B norandommap
Normally \fBfio\fR will cover every block of the file when doing random I/O. If
Default: 1.
.TP
.BI rate \fR=\fPint
-Cap bandwidth used by this job to this number of KiB/s.
+Cap bandwidth used by this job. The number is in bytes/sec, the normal postfix
+rules apply. You can use \fBrate\fR=500k to limit reads and writes to 500k each,
+or you can specify read and writes separately. Using \fBrate\fR=1m,500k would
+limit reads to 1MB/sec and writes to 500KB/sec. Capping only reads or writes
+can be done with \fBrate\fR=,500k or \fBrate\fR=500k,. The former will only
+limit writes (to 500KB/sec), the latter will only limit reads.
.TP
.BI ratemin \fR=\fPint
Tell \fBfio\fR to do whatever it can to maintain at least the given bandwidth.
-Failing to meet this requirement will cause the job to exit.
+Failing to meet this requirement will cause the job to exit. The same format
+as \fBrate\fR is used for read vs write separation.
.TP
.BI rate_iops \fR=\fPint
-Cap the bandwidth to this number of IOPS. If \fBblocksize\fR is a range, the
-smallest block size is used as the metric.
+Cap the bandwidth to this number of IOPS. Basically the same as rate, just
+specified independently of bandwidth. The same format as \fBrate\fR is used for
+read vs write seperation. If \fBblocksize\fR is a range, the smallest block
+size is used as the metric.
.TP
.BI rate_iops_min \fR=\fPint
-If this rate of I/O is not met, the job will exit.
+If this rate of I/O is not met, the job will exit. The same format as \fBrate\fR
+is used for read vs write seperation.
.TP
.BI ratecycle \fR=\fPint
Average bandwidth for \fBrate\fR and \fBratemin\fR over this number of
completely read or written. The same workload will be repeated as many times
as \fBruntime\fR allows.
.TP
+.BI ramp_time \fR=\fPint
+If set, fio will run the specified workload for this amount of time before
+logging any performance numbers. Useful for letting performance settle before
+logging results, thus minimizing the runtime required for stable results. Note
+that the \fBramp_time\fR is considered lead in time for a job, thus it will
+increase the total runtime if a special timeout or runtime is specified.
+.TP
.BI invalidate \fR=\fPbool
Invalidate buffer-cache for the file prior to starting I/O. Default: true.
.TP
.BI create_on_open \fR=\fPbool
If true, the files are not created until they are opened for IO by the job.
.TP
+.BI pre_read \fR=\fPbool
+If this is given, files will be pre-read into memory before starting the given
+IO operation. This will also clear the \fR \fBinvalidate\fR flag, since it is
+pointless to pre-read and then drop the cache.
+.TP
.BI unlink \fR=\fPbool
Unlink job files when done. Default: false.
.TP
Replay the I/O patterns contained in the specified file generated by
\fBwrite_iolog\fR, or may be a \fBblktrace\fR binary file.
.TP
-.B write_bw_log
-If given, write bandwidth logs of the jobs in this file.
+.B write_bw_log \fR=\fPstr
+If given, write a bandwidth log of the jobs in this job file. Can be used to
+store data of the bandwidth of the jobs in their lifetime. The included
+fio_generate_plots script uses gnuplot to turn these text files into nice
+graphs. See \fBwrite_log_log\fR for behaviour of given filename. For this
+option, the postfix is _bw.log.
.TP
.B write_lat_log
-Same as \fBwrite_bw_log\fR, but writes I/O completion latencies.
+Same as \fBwrite_bw_log\fR, but writes I/O completion latencies. If no
+filename is given with this option, the default filename of "jobname_type.log"
+is used. Even if the filename is given, fio will still append the type of log.
+.TP
+.B disable_clat \fR=\fPbool
+Disable measurements of completion latency numbers. Useful only for cutting
+back the number of calls to gettimeofday, as that does impact performance at
+really high IOPS rates. Note that to really get rid of a large amount of these
+calls, this option must be used with disable_slat and disable_bw as well.
+.TP
+.B disable_slat \fR=\fPbool
+Disable measurements of submission latency numbers. See \fBdisable_clat\fR.
+.TP
+.B disable_bw_measurement \fR=\fPbool
+Disable measurements of throughput/bandwidth numbers. See \fBdisable_clat\fR.
.TP
.BI lockmem \fR=\fPint
Pin the specified amount of memory with \fBmlock\fR\|(2). Can be used to
.TP
.BI disk_util \fR=\fPbool
Generate disk utilization statistics if the platform supports it. Default: true.
+.TP
+.BI gtod_reduce \fR=\fPbool
+Enable all of the gettimeofday() reducing options (disable_clat, disable_slat,
+disable_bw) plus reduce precision of the timeout somewhat to really shrink the
+gettimeofday() call count. With this option enabled, we only do about 0.4% of
+the gtod() calls we would have done if all time keeping was enabled.
+.TP
+.BI gtod_cpu \fR=\fPint
+Sometimes it's cheaper to dedicate a single thread of execution to just getting
+the current time. Fio (and databases, for instance) are very intensive on
+gettimeofday() calls. With this option, you can set one CPU aside for doing
+nothing but logging current time to a shared memory location. Then the other
+threads/processes that run IO workloads need only copy that segment, instead of
+entering the kernel with a gettimeofday() call. The CPU set aside for doing
+these time calls will be excluded from other uses. Fio will manually clear it
+from the CPU mask of other jobs.
.SH OUTPUT
While running, \fBfio\fR will display the status of the created jobs. For
example:
This man page was written by Aaron Carroll <aaronc@cse.unsw.edu.au> based
on documentation by Jens Axboe.
.SH "REPORTING BUGS"
-Report bugs to the \fBfio\fR mailing list <fio-devel@kernel.dk>.
+Report bugs to the \fBfio\fR mailing list <fio@vger.kernel.org>.
See \fBREADME\fR.
.SH "SEE ALSO"
For further documentation see \fBHOWTO\fR and \fBREADME\fR.
projects / fio.git / blobdiff