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diff --git a/Documentation/block/as-iosched.txt b/Documentation/block/as-iosched.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 738b72be128e..000000000000 --- a/Documentation/block/as-iosched.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,172 +0,0 @@ -Anticipatory IO scheduler -------------------------- -Nick Piggin <piggin@cyberone.com.au> 13 Sep 2003 - -Attention! Database servers, especially those using "TCQ" disks should -investigate performance with the 'deadline' IO scheduler. Any system with high -disk performance requirements should do so, in fact. - -If you see unusual performance characteristics of your disk systems, or you -see big performance regressions versus the deadline scheduler, please email -me. Database users don't bother unless you're willing to test a lot of patches -from me ;) its a known issue. - -Also, users with hardware RAID controllers, doing striping, may find -highly variable performance results with using the as-iosched. The -as-iosched anticipatory implementation is based on the notion that a disk -device has only one physical seeking head. A striped RAID controller -actually has a head for each physical device in the logical RAID device. - -However, setting the antic_expire (see tunable parameters below) produces -very similar behavior to the deadline IO scheduler. - -Selecting IO schedulers ------------------------ -Refer to Documentation/block/switching-sched.txt for information on -selecting an io scheduler on a per-device basis. - -Anticipatory IO scheduler Policies ----------------------------------- -The as-iosched implementation implements several layers of policies -to determine when an IO request is dispatched to the disk controller. -Here are the policies outlined, in order of application. - -1. one-way Elevator algorithm. - -The elevator algorithm is similar to that used in deadline scheduler, with -the addition that it allows limited backward movement of the elevator -(i.e. seeks backwards). A seek backwards can occur when choosing between -two IO requests where one is behind the elevator's current position, and -the other is in front of the elevator's position. If the seek distance to -the request in back of the elevator is less than half the seek distance to -the request in front of the elevator, then the request in back can be chosen. -Backward seeks are also limited to a maximum of MAXBACK (1024*1024) sectors. -This favors forward movement of the elevator, while allowing opportunistic -"short" backward seeks. - -2. FIFO expiration times for reads and for writes. - -This is again very similar to the deadline IO scheduler. The expiration -times for requests on these lists is tunable using the parameters read_expire -and write_expire discussed below. When a read or a write expires in this way, -the IO scheduler will interrupt its current elevator sweep or read anticipation -to service the expired request. - -3. Read and write request batching - -A batch is a collection of read requests or a collection of write -requests. The as scheduler alternates dispatching read and write batches -to the driver. In the case a read batch, the scheduler submits read -requests to the driver as long as there are read requests to submit, and -the read batch time limit has not been exceeded (read_batch_expire). -The read batch time limit begins counting down only when there are -competing write requests pending. - -In the case of a write batch, the scheduler submits write requests to -the driver as long as there are write requests available, and the -write batch time limit has not been exceeded (write_batch_expire). -However, the length of write batches will be gradually shortened -when read batches frequently exceed their time limit. - -When changing between batch types, the scheduler waits for all requests -from the previous batch to complete before scheduling requests for the -next batch. - -The read and write fifo expiration times described in policy 2 above -are checked only when in scheduling IO of a batch for the corresponding -(read/write) type. So for example, the read FIFO timeout values are -tested only during read batches. Likewise, the write FIFO timeout -values are tested only during write batches. For this reason, -it is generally not recommended for the read batch time -to be longer than the write expiration time, nor for the write batch -time to exceed the read expiration time (see tunable parameters below). - -When the IO scheduler changes from a read to a write batch, -it begins the elevator from the request that is on the head of the -write expiration FIFO. Likewise, when changing from a write batch to -a read batch, scheduler begins the elevator from the first entry -on the read expiration FIFO. - -4. Read anticipation. - -Read anticipation occurs only when scheduling a read batch. -This implementation of read anticipation allows only one read request -to be dispatched to the disk controller at a time. In -contrast, many write requests may be dispatched to the disk controller -at a time during a write batch. It is this characteristic that can make -the anticipatory scheduler perform anomalously with controllers supporting -TCQ, or with hardware striped RAID devices. Setting the antic_expire -queue parameter (see below) to zero disables this behavior, and the -anticipatory scheduler behaves essentially like the deadline scheduler. - -When read anticipation is enabled (antic_expire is not zero), reads -are dispatched to the disk controller one at a time. -At the end of each read request, the IO scheduler examines its next -candidate read request from its sorted read list. If that next request -is from the same process as the request that just completed, -or if the next request in the queue is "very close" to the -just completed request, it is dispatched immediately. Otherwise, -statistics (average think time, average seek distance) on the process -that submitted the just completed request are examined. If it seems -likely that that process will submit another request soon, and that -request is likely to be near the just completed request, then the IO -scheduler will stop dispatching more read requests for up to (antic_expire) -milliseconds, hoping that process will submit a new request near the one -that just completed. If such a request is made, then it is dispatched -immediately. If the antic_expire wait time expires, then the IO scheduler -will dispatch the next read request from the sorted read queue. - -To decide whether an anticipatory wait is worthwhile, the scheduler -maintains statistics for each process that can be used to compute -mean "think time" (the time between read requests), and mean seek -distance for that process. One observation is that these statistics -are associated with each process, but those statistics are not associated -with a specific IO device. So for example, if a process is doing IO -on several file systems on separate devices, the statistics will be -a combination of IO behavior from all those devices. - - -Tuning the anticipatory IO scheduler ------------------------------------- -When using 'as', the anticipatory IO scheduler there are 5 parameters under -/sys/block/*/queue/iosched/. All are units of milliseconds. - -The parameters are: -* read_expire - Controls how long until a read request becomes "expired". It also controls the - interval between which expired requests are served, so set to 50, a request - might take anywhere < 100ms to be serviced _if_ it is the next on the - expired list. Obviously request expiration strategies won't make the disk - go faster. The result basically equates to the timeslice a single reader - gets in the presence of other IO. 100*((seek time / read_expire) + 1) is - very roughly the % streaming read efficiency your disk should get with - multiple readers. - -* read_batch_expire - Controls how much time a batch of reads is given before pending writes are - served. A higher value is more efficient. This might be set below read_expire - if writes are to be given higher priority than reads, but reads are to be - as efficient as possible when there are no writes. Generally though, it - should be some multiple of read_expire. - -* write_expire, and -* write_batch_expire are equivalent to the above, for writes. - -* antic_expire - Controls the maximum amount of time we can anticipate a good read (one - with a short seek distance from the most recently completed request) before - giving up. Many other factors may cause anticipation to be stopped early, - or some processes will not be "anticipated" at all. Should be a bit higher - for big seek time devices though not a linear correspondence - most - processes have only a few ms thinktime. - -In addition to the tunables above there is a read-only file named est_time -which, when read, will show: - - - The probability of a task exiting without a cooperating task - submitting an anticipated IO. - - - The current mean think time. - - - The seek distance used to determine if an incoming IO is better. - |