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0001 =====================
0002 I/O statistics fields
0003 =====================
0004 
0005 Since 2.4.20 (and some versions before, with patches), and 2.5.45,
0006 more extensive disk statistics have been introduced to help measure disk
0007 activity. Tools such as ``sar`` and ``iostat`` typically interpret these and do
0008 the work for you, but in case you are interested in creating your own
0009 tools, the fields are explained here.
0010 
0011 In 2.4 now, the information is found as additional fields in
0012 ``/proc/partitions``.  In 2.6 and upper, the same information is found in two
0013 places: one is in the file ``/proc/diskstats``, and the other is within
0014 the sysfs file system, which must be mounted in order to obtain
0015 the information. Throughout this document we'll assume that sysfs
0016 is mounted on ``/sys``, although of course it may be mounted anywhere.
0017 Both ``/proc/diskstats`` and sysfs use the same source for the information
0018 and so should not differ.
0019 
0020 Here are examples of these different formats::
0021 
0022    2.4:
0023       3     0   39082680 hda 446216 784926 9550688 4382310 424847 312726 5922052 19310380 0 3376340 23705160
0024       3     1    9221278 hda1 35486 0 35496 38030 0 0 0 0 0 38030 38030
0025 
0026    2.6+ sysfs:
0027       446216 784926 9550688 4382310 424847 312726 5922052 19310380 0 3376340 23705160
0028       35486    38030    38030    38030
0029 
0030    2.6+ diskstats:
0031       3    0   hda 446216 784926 9550688 4382310 424847 312726 5922052 19310380 0 3376340 23705160
0032       3    1   hda1 35486 38030 38030 38030
0033 
0034    4.18+ diskstats:
0035       3    0   hda 446216 784926 9550688 4382310 424847 312726 5922052 19310380 0 3376340 23705160 0 0 0 0
0036 
0037 On 2.4 you might execute ``grep 'hda ' /proc/partitions``. On 2.6+, you have
0038 a choice of ``cat /sys/block/hda/stat`` or ``grep 'hda ' /proc/diskstats``.
0039 
0040 The advantage of one over the other is that the sysfs choice works well
0041 if you are watching a known, small set of disks.  ``/proc/diskstats`` may
0042 be a better choice if you are watching a large number of disks because
0043 you'll avoid the overhead of 50, 100, or 500 or more opens/closes with
0044 each snapshot of your disk statistics.
0045 
0046 In 2.4, the statistics fields are those after the device name. In
0047 the above example, the first field of statistics would be 446216.
0048 By contrast, in 2.6+ if you look at ``/sys/block/hda/stat``, you'll
0049 find just the 15 fields, beginning with 446216.  If you look at
0050 ``/proc/diskstats``, the 15 fields will be preceded by the major and
0051 minor device numbers, and device name.  Each of these formats provides
0052 15 fields of statistics, each meaning exactly the same things.
0053 All fields except field 9 are cumulative since boot.  Field 9 should
0054 go to zero as I/Os complete; all others only increase (unless they
0055 overflow and wrap). Wrapping might eventually occur on a very busy
0056 or long-lived system; so applications should be prepared to deal with
0057 it. Regarding wrapping, the types of the fields are either unsigned
0058 int (32 bit) or unsigned long (32-bit or 64-bit, depending on your
0059 machine) as noted per-field below. Unless your observations are very
0060 spread in time, these fields should not wrap twice before you notice it.
0061 
0062 Each set of stats only applies to the indicated device; if you want
0063 system-wide stats you'll have to find all the devices and sum them all up.
0064 
0065 Field  1 -- # of reads completed (unsigned long)
0066     This is the total number of reads completed successfully.
0067 
0068 Field  2 -- # of reads merged, field 6 -- # of writes merged (unsigned long)
0069     Reads and writes which are adjacent to each other may be merged for
0070     efficiency.  Thus two 4K reads may become one 8K read before it is
0071     ultimately handed to the disk, and so it will be counted (and queued)
0072     as only one I/O.  This field lets you know how often this was done.
0073 
0074 Field  3 -- # of sectors read (unsigned long)
0075     This is the total number of sectors read successfully.
0076 
0077 Field  4 -- # of milliseconds spent reading (unsigned int)
0078     This is the total number of milliseconds spent by all reads (as
0079     measured from blk_mq_alloc_request() to __blk_mq_end_request()).
0080 
0081 Field  5 -- # of writes completed (unsigned long)
0082     This is the total number of writes completed successfully.
0083 
0084 Field  6 -- # of writes merged  (unsigned long)
0085     See the description of field 2.
0086 
0087 Field  7 -- # of sectors written (unsigned long)
0088     This is the total number of sectors written successfully.
0089 
0090 Field  8 -- # of milliseconds spent writing (unsigned int)
0091     This is the total number of milliseconds spent by all writes (as
0092     measured from blk_mq_alloc_request() to __blk_mq_end_request()).
0093 
0094 Field  9 -- # of I/Os currently in progress (unsigned int)
0095     The only field that should go to zero. Incremented as requests are
0096     given to appropriate struct request_queue and decremented as they finish.
0097 
0098 Field 10 -- # of milliseconds spent doing I/Os (unsigned int)
0099     This field increases so long as field 9 is nonzero.
0100 
0101     Since 5.0 this field counts jiffies when at least one request was
0102     started or completed. If request runs more than 2 jiffies then some
0103     I/O time might be not accounted in case of concurrent requests.
0104 
0105 Field 11 -- weighted # of milliseconds spent doing I/Os (unsigned int)
0106     This field is incremented at each I/O start, I/O completion, I/O
0107     merge, or read of these stats by the number of I/Os in progress
0108     (field 9) times the number of milliseconds spent doing I/O since the
0109     last update of this field.  This can provide an easy measure of both
0110     I/O completion time and the backlog that may be accumulating.
0111 
0112 Field 12 -- # of discards completed (unsigned long)
0113     This is the total number of discards completed successfully.
0114 
0115 Field 13 -- # of discards merged (unsigned long)
0116     See the description of field 2
0117 
0118 Field 14 -- # of sectors discarded (unsigned long)
0119     This is the total number of sectors discarded successfully.
0120 
0121 Field 15 -- # of milliseconds spent discarding (unsigned int)
0122     This is the total number of milliseconds spent by all discards (as
0123     measured from blk_mq_alloc_request() to __blk_mq_end_request()).
0124 
0125 Field 16 -- # of flush requests completed
0126     This is the total number of flush requests completed successfully.
0127 
0128     Block layer combines flush requests and executes at most one at a time.
0129     This counts flush requests executed by disk. Not tracked for partitions.
0130 
0131 Field 17 -- # of milliseconds spent flushing
0132     This is the total number of milliseconds spent by all flush requests.
0133 
0134 To avoid introducing performance bottlenecks, no locks are held while
0135 modifying these counters.  This implies that minor inaccuracies may be
0136 introduced when changes collide, so (for instance) adding up all the
0137 read I/Os issued per partition should equal those made to the disks ...
0138 but due to the lack of locking it may only be very close.
0139 
0140 In 2.6+, there are counters for each CPU, which make the lack of locking
0141 almost a non-issue.  When the statistics are read, the per-CPU counters
0142 are summed (possibly overflowing the unsigned long variable they are
0143 summed to) and the result given to the user.  There is no convenient
0144 user interface for accessing the per-CPU counters themselves.
0145 
0146 Since 4.19 request times are measured with nanoseconds precision and
0147 truncated to milliseconds before showing in this interface.
0148 
0149 Disks vs Partitions
0150 -------------------
0151 
0152 There were significant changes between 2.4 and 2.6+ in the I/O subsystem.
0153 As a result, some statistic information disappeared. The translation from
0154 a disk address relative to a partition to the disk address relative to
0155 the host disk happens much earlier.  All merges and timings now happen
0156 at the disk level rather than at both the disk and partition level as
0157 in 2.4.  Consequently, you'll see a different statistics output on 2.6+ for
0158 partitions from that for disks.  There are only *four* fields available
0159 for partitions on 2.6+ machines.  This is reflected in the examples above.
0160 
0161 Field  1 -- # of reads issued
0162     This is the total number of reads issued to this partition.
0163 
0164 Field  2 -- # of sectors read
0165     This is the total number of sectors requested to be read from this
0166     partition.
0167 
0168 Field  3 -- # of writes issued
0169     This is the total number of writes issued to this partition.
0170 
0171 Field  4 -- # of sectors written
0172     This is the total number of sectors requested to be written to
0173     this partition.
0174 
0175 Note that since the address is translated to a disk-relative one, and no
0176 record of the partition-relative address is kept, the subsequent success
0177 or failure of the read cannot be attributed to the partition.  In other
0178 words, the number of reads for partitions is counted slightly before time
0179 of queuing for partitions, and at completion for whole disks.  This is
0180 a subtle distinction that is probably uninteresting for most cases.
0181 
0182 More significant is the error induced by counting the numbers of
0183 reads/writes before merges for partitions and after for disks. Since a
0184 typical workload usually contains a lot of successive and adjacent requests,
0185 the number of reads/writes issued can be several times higher than the
0186 number of reads/writes completed.
0187 
0188 In 2.6.25, the full statistic set is again available for partitions and
0189 disk and partition statistics are consistent again. Since we still don't
0190 keep record of the partition-relative address, an operation is attributed to
0191 the partition which contains the first sector of the request after the
0192 eventual merges. As requests can be merged across partition, this could lead
0193 to some (probably insignificant) inaccuracy.
0194 
0195 Additional notes
0196 ----------------
0197 
0198 In 2.6+, sysfs is not mounted by default.  If your distribution of
0199 Linux hasn't added it already, here's the line you'll want to add to
0200 your ``/etc/fstab``::
0201 
0202         none /sys sysfs defaults 0 0
0203 
0204 
0205 In 2.6+, all disk statistics were removed from ``/proc/stat``.  In 2.4, they
0206 appear in both ``/proc/partitions`` and ``/proc/stat``, although the ones in
0207 ``/proc/stat`` take a very different format from those in ``/proc/partitions``
0208 (see proc(5), if your system has it.)
0209 
0210 -- ricklind@us.ibm.com