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RxNetty vs Tomcat Performance Results


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A 2015 performance study by Brendan Gregg, Nitesh Kant, and Ben Christensen. Original is in

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RxNetty vs Tomcat Performance Results

  1. 1. RxNetty vs Tomcat Performance Results Brendan Gregg; Performance and Reliability Engineering Nitesh Kant, Ben Christensen; Edge Engineering updated: Apr 2015
  2. 2. Results based on ● The “Hello Netflix” benchmark (wsperflab) ● Tomcat ● RxNetty ● physical PC ○ Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-2400 CPU @ 3.10GHz: 4 cores, 1 thread per core ● OpenJDK 8 ○ with frame pointer patch ● Plus testing in other environments
  3. 3. Hello Netflix
  4. 4. RxNetty vs Tomcat performance In a variety of tests, RxNetty has been faster than Tomcat. This study covers: 1. What specifically is faster? 2. By how much? 3. Why?
  5. 5. 1. What specifically is faster?
  6. 6. 1. What specifically is faster? ● CPU consumption per request ○ RxNetty consumes less CPU than Tomcat ○ This also means that a given server (with fixed CPU capacity) can deliver a higher maximum rate of requests per second ● Latency under load ○ Under high load, RxNetty has a lower latency distribution than Tomcat
  7. 7. 2. By how much?
  8. 8. 2. By how much? The following 5 graphs show performance vs load (clients) 1. CPU consumption per request 2. CPU resource usage vs load 3. Request rate 4. Request average latency 5. Request maximum latency Bear in mind these results are for this environment, and this workload
  9. 9. 2.1. CPU Consumption Per Request ● RxNetty has generally lower CPU consumption per request (over 40% lower) ● RxNetty keeps getting faster under load, whereas Tomcat keeps getting slower
  10. 10. 2.2. CPU Resource Usage vs Load ● Load testing drove the server’s CPUs to near 100% for both frameworks
  11. 11. 2.3. Request Rate ● RxNetty achieved a 46% higher request rate ● This is mostly due to the lower CPU consumption per request
  12. 12. 2.4. Request Average Latency ● Average latency increases past the req/sec knee point (when CPU begins to be saturated) ● RxNetty’s latency breakdown happens with much higher load
  13. 13. 2.5. Request Maximum Latency ● The degradation in maximum latency for Tomcat is much more severe
  14. 14. 3. Why?
  15. 15. 3. Why? 1. CPU consumption per request ○ RxNetty is lower due to its framework code and lower object allocation rate, which in turn reduces GC overheads ○ RxNetty also trends lower due to its event loop architecture, which reduces thread migrations under load, which improves CPU cache warmth and memory locality, which improves CPU Instructions Per Cycle (IPC), which lowers CPU cycle consumption per request 2. Lower latencies under load ○ Tomcat has higher latencies under load due to its thread pool architecture, which involves thread pool locks (and lock contention) and thread migrations to service load
  16. 16. 3.1. CPU Consumption Per Request Studied using: 1. Kernel CPU flame graphs 2. User CPU flame graphs 3. Migration rates 4. Last Level Cache (LLC) Loads & IPC 5. IPC & CPU per request
  17. 17. 3.1.1. Kernel CPU Flame Graphs
  18. 18. read futex write poll Tomcat
  19. 19. epoll writeread RxNetty
  20. 20. 3.1.1. Kernel CPU Time Differences CPU system time delta per request: 0.07 ms ● Tomcat futex(), for thread pool management (0.05 ms) ● Tomcat poll() vs RxNetty epoll() (0.02 ms extra)
  21. 21. 3.1.2. User CPU Flame Graphs
  22. 22. User CPU Flame Graph: Tomcat (many differences)
  23. 23. User CPU Flame Graph: RxNetty
  24. 24. 3.1.2. User CPU Time Differences CPU user time delta per request: 0.14 ms Differences include: ● Extra GC time in Tomcat ● Framework code differences ● Socket read library ● Tomcat thread pool calls
  25. 25. 3.1.3. Thread Migrations ● As load increases, RxNetty begins to experience lower thread migrations ● There is enough queued work for event loop threads to keep servicing requests without switching rxNetty migrations
  26. 26. 3.1.4. LLC Loads & IPC ● … The reduction in thread migrations keeps threads on-CPU, which keeps caches warm, reducing LLC loads, and improving IPC rxNetty LLC loads / req rxNetty IPC
  27. 27. 3.1.5. IPC & CPU Per Request ● … A higher IPC leads to lower CPU usage per request rxNetty CPU / req rxNetty IPC
  28. 28. 3.2. Lower Latencies Under Load Studied using: 1. Migration rates (previous graph) 2. Context-switch flame graphs 3. Chain graphs
  29. 29. 3.2.2. Context Switch Flame Graphs ● These identify the cause of context switches, and blocking events. ○ They do not quantify the magnitude of off-CPU time; these are for identification of targets for further study ● Tomcat has additional futex context switches from thread pool management
  30. 30. Context Switch Flame Graph: Tomcat ThreadPool Executor locks
  31. 31. Context Switch Flame Graph: RxNetty (epoll)
  32. 32. 3.2.3. Chain Graphs ● These quantify the magnitude of off-CPU (blocking) time, and show the chain of wakeup stacks that the blocked thread was waiting on ○ x-axis: blocked time ○ y-axis: blocked stack, then wakeup stacks
  33. 33. Chain Graph: Tomcat XXX Normal blocking path: server thread waits on backend network I/O Tomcat blocked on itself: thread pool locks Chain Graph: Tomcat server: java-11516 backend: java-18008
  34. 34. Reasoning ● On a system with more CPUs (than 4), Tomcat will perform even worse, due to the earlier effects. ● For applications which consume more CPU, the benefits of an architecture change diminish.
  35. 35. Summary
  36. 36. Under light load, both have similar performance, with RxNetty using less CPU With increased load, RxNetty begins to migrate less, improving IPC, and CPU usage per request At high load, RxNetty delivers a higher req rate, with a lower latency distribution due to its architecture