X-Git-Url: https://git.kernel.dk/?p=fio.git;a=blobdiff_plain;f=README;h=2fa8e1bbac41db9af25546753480f1bf370e6567;hp=b662e714d62bb6f88f3880c5b5607c52a31556b6;hb=95a12fbe88afa768926403c5a4ef53346ba2544d;hpb=8ea39c32d29428b17bfe9c806fc33f0c8adfe118 diff --git a/README b/README index b662e714..2fa8e1bb 100644 --- a/README +++ b/README @@ -14,17 +14,29 @@ Source fio resides in a git repo, the canonical place is: -git://git.kernel.dk/fio.git + git://git.kernel.dk/fio.git -If you are inside a corporate firewall, git:// may not always work for -you. In that case you can use the http protocol, path is the same: +When inside a corporate firewall, git:// URL sometimes does not work. +If git:// does not work, use the http protocol instead: -http://git.kernel.dk/fio.git + http://git.kernel.dk/fio.git -Snapshots are frequently generated and they include the git meta data as -well. You can download them here: +Snapshots are frequently generated and include the git meta data as well. +Snapshots can download from: -http://brick.kernel.dk/snaps/ + http://brick.kernel.dk/snaps/ + +There are also two official mirrors. Both of these are automatically synced +with the main repository, when changes are pushed. If the main repo is down +for some reason, either one of these is safe to use as a backup: + + git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/axboe/fio.git + https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/axboe/fio.git + +or + + git://github.com/axboe/fio.git + https://github.com/axboe/fio.git Binary packages @@ -53,75 +65,75 @@ tool (http://www.opencsw.org/get-it/pkgutil/) and then install fio via 'pkgutil -i fio'. Windows: -Bruce Cran has fio packages for Windows at +Rebecca Cran has fio packages for Windows at http://www.bluestop.org/fio/ . Mailing list ------------ -There's a mailing list associated with fio. It's meant for general -discussion, bug reporting, questions, and development - basically anything -that has to do with fio. An automated mail detailing recent commits is -automatically sent to the list at most daily. The list address is -fio@vger.kernel.org, subscribe by sending an email to -majordomo@vger.kernel.org with +The fio project mailing list is meant for anything related to fio including +general discussion, bug reporting, questions, and development. + +An automated mail detailing recent commits is automatically sent to the +list at most daily. The list address is fio@vger.kernel.org, subscribe +by sending an email to majordomo@vger.kernel.org with -subscribe fio + subscribe fio in the body of the email. Archives can be found here: -http://www.spinics.net/lists/fio/ + http://www.spinics.net/lists/fio/ and archives for the old list can be found here: -http://maillist.kernel.dk/fio-devel/ + http://maillist.kernel.dk/fio-devel/ Building -------- -Just type 'make' and 'make install'. +Just type 'configure', 'make' and 'make install'. Note that GNU make is required. On BSD it's available from devel/gmake; on Solaris it's in the SUNWgmake package. On platforms where GNU make isn't the default, type 'gmake' instead of 'make'. -If your compile fails with an error like this: +Configure will print the enabled options. Note that on Linux based +platforms, the libaio development packages must be installed to use +the libaio engine. Depending on distro, it is usually called +libaio-devel or libaio-dev. - CC gettime.o -In file included from fio.h:23, - from gettime.c:8: -os/os.h:15:20: error: libaio.h: No such file or directory -In file included from gettime.c:8: -fio.h:119: error: field 'iocb' has incomplete type -make: *** [gettime.o] Error 1 +For gfio, gtk 2.18 (or newer), associated glib threads, and cairo are required +to be installed. gfio isn't built automatically and can be enabled +with a --enable-gfio option to configure. -Check that you have the libaio development package installed. On RPM -based distros, it's typically called libaio-devel. +To build FIO with a cross-compiler: + $ make clean + $ make CROSS_COMPILE=/path/to/toolchain/prefix +Configure will attempt to determine the target platform automatically. + +It's possible to build fio for ESX as well, use the --esx switch to +configure. Windows ------- -On Windows Cygwin (http://www.cygwin.com/) is required in order to -build fio. To create an MSI installer package install WiX 3.7 from +On Windows, Cygwin (http://www.cygwin.com/) is required in order to +build fio. To create an MSI installer package install WiX 3.8 from http://wixtoolset.org and run dobuild.cmd from the os/windows directory. -How to compile FIO on 64-bit Windows: +How to compile fio on 64-bit Windows: - 1. Install Cygwin (http://www.cygwin.com/setup.exe). Install 'make' and all + 1. Install Cygwin (http://www.cygwin.com/). Install 'make' and all packages starting with 'mingw64-i686' and 'mingw64-x86_64'. - 2. Download ftp://sourceware.org/pub/pthreads-win32/prebuilt-dll-2-9-1-release/dll/x64/pthreadGC2.dll - and copy to the fio source directory. - 3. Open the Cygwin Terminal. - 4. Go to the fio directory (source files). - 5. Run 'make clean'. - 6. Run 'make'. + 2. Open the Cygwin Terminal. + 3. Go to the fio directory (source files). + 4. Run 'make clean && make -j'. -To build fio on 32-bit Windows, download x86/pthreadGC2.dll instead and do -'./configure --build-32bit-win=yes' before 'make'. +To build fio on 32-bit Windows, run './configure --build-32bit-win' before 'make'. It's recommended that once built or installed, fio be run in a Command Prompt or other 'native' console such as console2, since there are known to be display @@ -134,50 +146,60 @@ Command line $ fio --debug Enable some debugging options (see below) + --parse-only Parse options only, don't start any IO --output Write output to file --runtime Runtime in seconds - --latency-log Generate per-job latency logs - --bandwidth-log Generate per-job bandwidth logs + --bandwidth-log Generate aggregate bandwidth logs --minimal Minimal (terse) output - --output-format=type Output format (terse,json,normal) - --terse-version=type Terse version output format (default 3, or 2 or 4). + --output-format=type Output format (terse,json,json+,normal) + --terse-version=type Set terse version output format (default 3, or 2 or 4) --version Print version info and exit --help Print this page --cpuclock-test Perform test/validation of CPU clock + --crctest=type Test speed of checksum functions --cmdhelp=cmd Print command help, "all" for all of them --enghelp=engine Print ioengine help, or list available ioengines --enghelp=engine,cmd Print help for an ioengine cmd --showcmd Turn a job file into command line options - --readonly Turn on safety read-only checks, preventing - writes --eta=when When ETA estimate should be printed May be "always", "never" or "auto" --eta-newline=time Force a new line for every 'time' period passed + --status-interval=t Force full status dump every 't' period passed + --readonly Turn on safety read-only checks, preventing writes --section=name Only run specified section in job file. Multiple sections can be specified. - --alloc-size=kb Set smalloc pool to this size in kb (def 1024) + --alloc-size=kb Set smalloc pool to this size in kb (def 16384) --warnings-fatal Fio parser warnings are fatal - --max-jobs Maximum number of threads/processes to support - --server=args Start backend server. See Client/Server section. - --client=host Connect to specified backend. + --max-jobs=nr Maximum number of threads/processes to support + --server=args Start a backend fio server. See Client/Server section. + --client=hostname Talk to remote backend(s) fio server at hostname + --daemonize=pidfile Background fio server, write pid to file + --remote-config=file Tell fio server to load this local job file --idle-prof=option Report cpu idleness on a system or percpu basis (option=system,percpu) or run unit work - calibration only (option=calibrate). + calibration only (option=calibrate) + --inflate-log=log Inflate and output compressed log + --trigger-file=file Execute trigger cmd when file exists + --trigger-timeout=t Execute trigger af this time + --trigger=cmd Set this command as local trigger + --trigger-remote=cmd Set this command as remote trigger + --aux-path=path Use this path for fio state generated files Any parameters following the options will be assumed to be job files, -unless they match a job file parameter. You can add as many as you want, -each job file will be regarded as a separate group and fio will stonewall -its execution. +unless they match a job file parameter. Multiple job files can be listed +and each job file will be regarded as a separate group. fio will stonewall +execution between each group. -The --readonly switch is an extra safety guard to prevent accidentally -turning on a write setting when that is not desired. Fio will only write -if rw=write/randwrite/rw/randrw is given, but this extra safety net can -be used as an extra precaution. It will also enable a write check in the -io engine core to prevent an accidental write due to a fio bug. +The --readonly option is an extra safety guard to prevent users from +accidentally starting a write workload when that is not desired. Fio +will only write if rw=write/randwrite/rw/randrw is given. This extra +safety net can be used as an extra precaution as --readonly will also +enable a write check in the io engine core to prevent writes due to +unknown user space bug(s). -The debug switch allows adding options that trigger certain logging -options in fio. Currently the options are: +The --debug option triggers additional logging by fio. +Currently, additional logging is available for: process Dump info related to processes file Dump info related to file actions @@ -193,163 +215,65 @@ options in fio. Currently the options are: mutex Dump info only related to mutex up/down ops profile Dump info related to profile extensions time Dump info related to internal time keeping + net Dump info related to networking connections + rate Dump info related to IO rate switching + compress Dump info related to log compress/decompress + steadystate Dump info related to steady state detection + helperthread Dump info related to helper thread ? or help Show available debug options. -You can specify as many as you want, eg --debug=file,mem will enable +One can specify multiple debug options: e.g. --debug=file,mem will enable file and memory debugging. -The section switch is meant to make it easier to ship a bigger job file -instead of several smaller ones. Say you define a job file with light, -moderate, and heavy parts. Then you can ask fio to run the given part -only by giving it a --section=heavy command line option. The section -option only applies to job sections, the reserved 'global' section is -always parsed and taken into account. +The --section option allows one to combine related jobs into one file. +E.g. one job file could define light, moderate, and heavy sections. Tell fio to +run only the "heavy" section by giving --section=heavy command line option. +One can also specify the "write" operations in one section and "verify" +operation in another section. The --section option only applies to job +sections. The reserved 'global' section is always parsed and used. + +The --alloc-size switch allows one to use a larger pool size for smalloc. +If running large jobs with randommap enabled, fio can run out of memory. +Smalloc is an internal allocator for shared structures from a fixed size +memory pool. The pool size defaults to 16MiB and can grow to 8 pools. -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 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. The backing store is -files in /tmp. Fio cleans up after itself, while it is running you -may see .fio_smalloc.* files in /tmp. +NOTE: While running .fio_smalloc.* backing store files are visible in /tmp. Job file -------- -See the HOWTO file for a more detailed description of parameters and what -they mean. This file contains the terse version. You can describe big and -complex setups with the command line, but generally it's a lot easier to -just write a simple job file to describe the workload. The job file format -is in the ini style format, as that is easy to read and write for the user. - -The job file parameters are: - - name=x Use 'x' as the identifier for this job. - description=x 'x' is a text description of the job. - directory=x Use 'x' as the top level directory for storing files - filename=x Force the use of 'x' as the filename for all files - in this thread. If not given, fio will make up - a suitable filename based on the thread and file - number. - rw=x 'x' may be: read, randread, write, randwrite, - rw (read-write mix), randrw (read-write random mix) - rwmixcycle=x Base cycle for switching between read and write - in msecs. - rwmixread=x 'x' percentage of rw mix ios will be reads. If - rwmixwrite is also given, the last of the two will - be used if they don't add up to 100%. - rwmixwrite=x 'x' percentage of rw mix ios will be writes. See - rwmixread. - rand_repeatable=x The sequence of random io blocks can be repeatable - across runs, if 'x' is 1. - size=x Set file size to x bytes (x string can include k/m/g) - ioengine=x 'x' may be: aio/libaio/linuxaio for Linux aio, - posixaio for POSIX aio, solarisaio for Solaris - native async IO, windowsaio for Windows native async IO, - sync for regular read/write io, - psync for regular pread/pwrite io, vsync for regular - readv/writev (with queuing emulation) mmap for mmap'ed - io, syslet-rw for syslet driven read/write, splice for - using splice/vmsplice, sg for direct SG_IO io, net - for network io, rdma for RDMA io, or cpuio for a - cycler burner load. sg only works on Linux on - SCSI (or SCSI-like devices, such as usb-storage or - sata/libata driven) devices. Fio also has a null - io engine, which is mainly used for testing - fio itself. - - iodepth=x For async io, allow 'x' ios in flight - overwrite=x If 'x', layout a write file first. - nrfiles=x Spread io load over 'x' number of files per job, - if possible. - prio=x Run io at prio X, 0-7 is the kernel allowed range - prioclass=x Run io at prio class X - bs=x Use 'x' for thread blocksize. May include k/m postfix. - bsrange=x-y Mix thread block sizes randomly between x and y. May - 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 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. - numa_cpu_nodes=x,y-z Allow job to run on specified NUMA nodes' CPU. - numa_mem_policy=m:x,y-z Setup numa memory allocation policy. - 'm' stands for policy, such as local, interleave, - bind, prefer, local. 'x, y-z' are numa node(s) for - memory allocation according to policy. - fsync=x If writing with buffered IO, fsync after every - 'x' blocks have been written. - end_fsync=x If 'x', run fsync() after end-of-job. - startdelay=x Start this thread x seconds after startup - runtime=x Terminate x seconds after startup. Can include a - normal time suffix if not given in seconds, such as - 'm' for minutes, 'h' for hours, and 'd' for days. - offset=x Start io at offset x (x string can include k/m/g) - invalidate=x Invalidate page cache for file prior to doing io - sync=x Use sync writes if x and writing buffered IO. - mem=x If x == malloc, use malloc for buffers. If x == shm, - use shared memory for buffers. If x == mmap, use - anonymous mmap. - exitall When one thread quits, terminate the others - bwavgtime=x Average bandwidth stats over an x msec window. - create_serialize=x If 'x', serialize file creation. - create_fsync=x If 'x', run fsync() after file creation. - unlink If set, unlink files when done. - loops=x Run the job 'x' number of times. - verify=x If 'x' == md5, use md5 for verifies. If 'x' == crc32, - use crc32 for verifies. md5 is 'safer', but crc32 is - a lot faster. Only makes sense for writing to a file. - For other types of checksumming, see HOWTO. - stonewall Wait for preceeding jobs to end before running. - numjobs=x Create 'x' similar entries for this job - thread Use pthreads instead of forked jobs - zonesize=x - zoneskip=y Zone options must be paired. If given, the job - will skip y bytes for every x read/written. This - can be used to gauge hard drive speed over the entire - platter, without reading everything. Both x/y can - include k/m/g suffix. - read_iolog=x Open and read io pattern from file 'x'. The file format - is described in the HOWTO. - write_iolog=x Write an iolog to file 'x' in the same format as iolog. - The iolog options are exclusive, if both given the - read iolog will be performed. Specify a separate file - for each job, otherwise the iologs will be interspersed - and the file may be corrupt. - write_bw_log Write a bandwidth log. - write_lat_log Write a latency log. - lockmem=x Lock down x amount of memory on the machine, to - simulate a machine with less memory available. x can - include k/m/g suffix. - nice=x Run job at given nice value. - exec_prerun=x Run 'x' before job io is begun. - exec_postrun=x Run 'x' after job io has finished. - ioscheduler=x Use ioscheduler 'x' for this job. - cpuload=x For a CPU io thread, percentage of CPU time to attempt - to burn. - cpuchunks=x Split burn cycles into pieces of x usecs. +See the HOWTO file for a complete description of job file syntax and +parameters. The --cmdhelp option also lists all options. If used with +an option argument, --cmdhelp will detail the given option. The job file +format is in the ini style format, as that is easy for the user to review +and modify. + +This README contains the terse version. Job files can describe big and +complex setups that are not possible with the command line. Job files +are a good practice even for simple jobs since the file provides an +easily accessed record of the workload and can include comments. +See the examples/ directory for inspiration on how to write job files. Note +the copyright and license requirements currently apply to examples/ files. Client/server ------------ -Normally you would run fio as a stand-alone application on the machine -where the IO workload should be generated. However, it is also possible to -run the frontend and backend of fio separately. This makes it possible to -have a fio server running on the machine(s) where the IO workload should -be running, while controlling it from another machine. +Normally fio is invoked as a stand-alone application on the machine +where the IO workload should be generated. However, the frontend and +backend of fio can be run separately. Ie the fio server can generate +an IO workload on the "Device Under Test" while being controlled from +another machine. -To start the server, you would do: +Start the server on the machine which has access to the storage DUT: fio --server=args -on that machine, where args defines what fio listens to. The arguments -are of the form 'type,hostname or IP,port'. 'type' is either 'ip' (or ip4) -for TCP/IP v4, 'ip6' for TCP/IP v6, or 'sock' for a local unix domain socket. +where args defines what fio listens to. The arguments are of the form +'type,hostname or IP,port'. 'type' is either 'ip' (or ip4) for TCP/IP v4, +'ip6' for TCP/IP v6, or 'sock' for a local unix domain socket. 'hostname' is either a hostname or IP address, and 'port' is the port to listen to (only valid for TCP/IP, not a local socket). Some examples: @@ -377,27 +301,61 @@ listen to (only valid for TCP/IP, not a local socket). Some examples: Start a fio server, listening on the local socket /tmp/fio.sock. -When a server is running, you can connect to it from a client. The client -is run with: +Once a server is running, a "client" can connect to the fio server with: -fio --local-args --client=server --remote-args +fio --local-args --client= --remote-args -where --local-args are arguments that are local to the client where it is +where --local-args are arguments for the client where it is running, 'server' is the connect string, and --remote-args and are sent to the server. The 'server' string follows the same format as it does on the server side, to allow IP/hostname/socket and port strings. -You can connect to multiple clients as well, to do that you could run: -fio --client=server2 --client=server2 +Fio can connect to multiple servers this way: + +fio --client= --client= + +If the job file is located on the fio server, then you can tell the server +to load a local file as well. This is done by using --remote-config: + +fio --client=server --remote-config /path/to/file.fio + +Then fio will open this local (to the server) job file instead +of being passed one from the client. + +If you have many servers (example: 100 VMs/containers), +you can input a pathname of a file containing host IPs/names as the parameter +value for the --client option. For example, here is an example "host.list" +file containing 2 hostnames: + +host1.your.dns.domain +host2.your.dns.domain + +The fio command would then be: + +fio --client=host.list + +In this mode, you cannot input server-specific parameters or job files -- all +servers receive the same job file. + +In order to let fio --client runs use a shared filesystem +from multiple hosts, fio --client now prepends the IP address of the +server to the filename. For example, if fio is using directory /mnt/nfs/fio +and is writing filename fileio.tmp, with a --client hostfile containing +two hostnames h1 and h2 with IP addresses 192.168.10.120 and 192.168.10.121, +then fio will create two files: + + /mnt/nfs/fio/192.168.10.120.fileio.tmp + /mnt/nfs/fio/192.168.10.121.fileio.tmp Platforms --------- -Fio works on (at least) Linux, Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, OSX, NetBSD, Windows -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). +Fio works on (at least) Linux, Solaris, AIX, HP-UX, OSX, NetBSD, OpenBSD, +Windows, FreeBSD, and DragonFly. 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 @@ -415,12 +373,12 @@ 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. -Note that POSIX aio is not enabled by default on AIX. If you get messages like: +Note that POSIX aio is not enabled by default on AIX. Messages like these: Symbol resolution failed for /usr/lib/libc.a(posix_aio.o) because: Symbol _posix_kaio_rdwr (number 2) is not exported from dependent module /unix. -you need to enable POSIX aio. Run the following commands as root: +indicate one needs to enable POSIX aio. Run the following commands as root: # lsdev -C -l posix_aio0 posix_aio0 Defined Posix Asynchronous I/O