summaryrefslogtreecommitdiff
path: root/spec/lib/gitlab/metrics
Commit message (Collapse)AuthorAgeFilesLines
* Fix Rubocop styling in AR subscriber specsmetrics-tuningYorick Peterse2016-01-041-1/+1
|
* Automatically prefix transaction series namesYorick Peterse2016-01-045-8/+8
| | | | | This ensures Rails and Sidekiq transactions are split into the series "rails_transactions" and "sidekiq_transactions" respectively.
* Use separate series for Rails/Sidekiq sample statsYorick Peterse2016-01-041-8/+30
| | | | | This removes the need for any tags to differentiate between Sidekiq and Rails statistics while still being able to separate the two.
* Track total method call times per transactionYorick Peterse2016-01-041-0/+6
| | | | | This makes it easier to see where time is spent without having to aggregate all the individual points in the method_calls series.
* Track total query/view timings in transactionsYorick Peterse2016-01-042-0/+38
|
* Ability to increment custom transaction valuesYorick Peterse2016-01-041-0/+12
| | | | | | This will be used to store/increment the total query/view rendering timings on a per transaction basis. This in turn can greatly reduce the amount of metrics stored.
* Removed tracking of hostnames for metricsYorick Peterse2015-12-311-2/+0
| | | | | This isn't hugely useful and mostly wastes InfluxDB space. We can re-add this whenever needed (but only once we really need it).
* Use separate series for Rails/Sidekiq transactionsYorick Peterse2015-12-315-6/+5
| | | | This removes the need for tagging all metrics with a "process_type" tag.
* Removed tracking of raw SQL queriesYorick Peterse2015-12-312-125/+0
| | | | | | | | | | | | This particular setup had 3 problems: 1. Storing SQL queries as tags is very inefficient as InfluxDB ends up indexing every query (and they can get pretty large). Storing these as values instead means we can't always display the SQL as easily. 2. We already instrument ActiveRecord query methods, thus we already have timing information about database queries. 3. SQL obfuscation is difficult to get right and I'd rather not expose sensitive data by accident.
* Removed various default metrics tagsreduce-influxdb-tagsYorick Peterse2015-12-311-3/+0
| | | | | | | | While it's useful to keep track of the different versions (Ruby, GitLab, etc) doing so for every point wastes disk space and possibly also RAM (which InfluxDB is all to eager to gobble up). If we want to see the performance differences between different GitLab versions simply looking at the performance since the last release date should suffice.
* Write to InfluxDB directly via UDPYorick Peterse2015-12-293-10/+2
| | | | | | | | | | | | | This removes the need for Sidekiq and any overhead/problems introduced by TCP. There are a few things to take into account: 1. When writing data to InfluxDB you may still get an error if the server becomes unavailable during the write. Because of this we're catching all exceptions and just ignore them (for now). 2. Writing via UDP apparently requires the timestamp to be in nanoseconds. Without this data either isn't written properly. 3. Due to the restrictions on UDP buffer sizes we're writing metrics one by one, instead of writing all of them at once.
* Strip newlines from obfuscated SQLYorick Peterse2015-12-291-0/+6
| | | | | Newlines aren't really needed and they may mess with InfluxDB's line protocol.
* Track object counts using the "allocations" GemYorick Peterse2015-12-171-0/+4
| | | | | This allows us to track the counts of actual classes instead of "T_XXX" nodes. This is only enabled on CRuby as it uses CRuby specific APIs.
* Support for instrumenting class hierarchiesYorick Peterse2015-12-171-0/+33
| | | | This will be used to (for example) instrument all ActiveRecord models.
* Only track method calls above a certain thresholdYorick Peterse2015-12-171-0/+24
| | | | | | | This ensures we don't end up wasting resources by tracking method calls that only take a few microseconds. By default the threshold is 10 milliseconds but this can be changed using the gitlab.yml configuration file.
* Allow filtering of what methods to instrumentYorick Peterse2015-12-171-0/+16
| | | | | This makes it possible to determine if a method should be instrumented or not using a block.
* Track location information as tagsYorick Peterse2015-12-172-4/+10
| | | | | | This allows the information to be displayed when using certain functions (e.g. top()) as well as making it easier to aggregate on a per file basis.
* Replace double quotes when obfuscating SQLYorick Peterse2015-12-171-0/+8
| | | | | | | InfluxDB escapes double quotes upon output which makes it a pain to deal with. This ensures that if we're using PostgreSQL we don't store any queries containing double quotes in InfluxDB, solving the escaping problem.
* Track object count types as tagsYorick Peterse2015-12-171-1/+2
|
* Only instrument methods defined directlyYorick Peterse2015-12-171-0/+26
| | | | | | | | | | When using instrument_methods/instrument_instance_methods we only want to instrument methods defined directly in a class, not those included via mixins (e.g. whatever RSpec throws in during development). In case an externally included method _has_ to be instrumented we can still use the regular instrument_method/instrument_instance_method methods.
* Added Instrumentation.configureYorick Peterse2015-12-171-1/+9
| | | | | This makes it easier to instrument multiple modules without having to type the full namespace over and over again.
* Methods for instrumenting multiple methodsYorick Peterse2015-12-171-5/+29
| | | | | | The methods Instrumentation.instrument_methods and Instrumentation.instrument_instance_methods can be used to instrument all methods of a module at once.
* Use custom code for instrumenting method callsYorick Peterse2015-12-172-46/+16
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The use of ActiveSupport would slow down instrumented method calls by about 180x due to: 1. ActiveSupport itself not being the fastest thing on the planet 2. caller_locations() having quite some overhead The use of caller_locations() has been removed because it's not _that_ useful since we already know the full namespace of receivers and the names of the called methods. The use of ActiveSupport has been replaced with some custom code that's generated using eval() (which can be quite a bit faster than using define_method). This new setup results in instrumented methods only being about 35-40x slower (compared to non instrumented methods).
* Use string evaluation for method instrumentationYorick Peterse2015-12-172-4/+5
| | | | | This is faster than using define_method since we don't have to keep block bindings around.
* Storing of application metrics in InfluxDBYorick Peterse2015-12-1712-0/+642
This adds the ability to write application metrics (e.g. SQL timings) to InfluxDB. These metrics can in turn be visualized using Grafana, or really anything else that can read from InfluxDB. These metrics can be used to track application performance over time, between different Ruby versions, different GitLab versions, etc. == Transaction Metrics Currently the following is tracked on a per transaction basis (a transaction is a Rails request or a single Sidekiq job): * Timings per query along with the raw (obfuscated) SQL and information about what file the query originated from. * Timings per view along with the path of the view and information about what file triggered the rendering process. * The duration of a request itself along with the controller/worker class and method name. * The duration of any instrumented method calls (more below). == Sampled Metrics Certain metrics can't be directly associated with a transaction. For example, a process' total memory usage is unrelated to any running transactions. While a transaction can result in the memory usage going up there's no accurate way to determine what transaction is to blame, this becomes especially problematic in multi-threaded environments. To solve this problem there's a separate thread that takes samples at a fixed interval. This thread (using the class Gitlab::Metrics::Sampler) currently tracks the following: * The process' total memory usage. * The number of file descriptors opened by the process. * The amount of Ruby objects (using ObjectSpace.count_objects). * GC statistics such as timings, heap slots, etc. The default/current interval is 15 seconds, any smaller interval might put too much pressure on InfluxDB (especially when running dozens of processes). == Method Instrumentation While currently not yet used methods can be instrumented to track how long they take to run. Unlike the likes of New Relic this doesn't require modifying the source code (e.g. including modules), it all happens from the outside. For example, to track `User.by_login` we'd add the following code somewhere in an initializer: Gitlab::Metrics::Instrumentation. instrument_method(User, :by_login) to instead instrument an instance method: Gitlab::Metrics::Instrumentation. instrument_instance_method(User, :save) Instrumentation for either all public model methods or a few crucial ones will be added in the near future, I simply haven't gotten to doing so just yet. == Configuration By default metrics are disabled. This means users don't have to bother setting anything up if they don't want to. Metrics can be enabled by editing one's gitlab.yml configuration file (see config/gitlab.yml.example for example settings). == Writing Data To InfluxDB Because InfluxDB is still a fairly young product I expect the worse. Data loss, unexpected reboots, the database not responding, you name it. Because of this data is _not_ written to InfluxDB directly, instead it's queued and processed by Sidekiq. This ensures that users won't notice anything when InfluxDB is giving trouble. The metrics worker can be started in a standalone manner as following: bundle exec sidekiq -q metrics The corresponding class is called MetricsWorker.