report: update to vpp performance release notes
[csit.git] / docs / report / vpp_performance_tests / csit_release_notes.rst
index 2e4377f..4f986eb 100644 (file)
@@ -1,3 +1,5 @@
+.. _vpp_performance_tests_release_notes:
+
 Release Notes
 =============
 
@@ -6,91 +8,38 @@ Changes in |csit-release|
 
 #. VPP PERFORMANCE TESTS
 
-   - **Intel Xeon 2n-skx, 3n-skx and 2n-clx testbeds**: VPP performance
-     test data is not included in this report version. This is due to
-     the lower performance and behaviour inconsistency of these
-     systems following the upgrade of processor microcode packages
-     (skx ucode 0x2000064, clx ucode 0x500002c), done as part of
-     updating Ubuntu 18.04 LTS kernel version. Tested VPP and DPDK
-     applications (L3fwd) are affected. Skx and Clx test data will be
-     added in subsequent maintenance report version(s) once the issue
-     is resolved. See :ref:`vpp_known_issues`.
-
-   - **Service density 2n-skx tests**: Added new NF density tests with
-     IPsec encryption between DUTs.
-
-   - **AVF tests**: Full test coveraged based on code changes in CSIT
-     core layer (driver/interface awareness) and generated by suite
-     generator (Intel Fortville NICs only).
-
-   - **Hoststack tests**: Major refactor of VPP Hoststack TCP/IP
-     performance tests using WRK generator talking to the VPP HTTP
-     static server plugin measuring connections per second and
-     requests per second. Added new iperf3 with LDPreload tests,
-     iperf3/LDPreload tests with packet loss induced via the VPP NSIM
-     (Network Simulator) plugin, and QUIC/UDP/IP transport tests.
-     All of the new tests measure goodput through the VPP Hoststack
-     from client to server.
-
-   - **Latency HDRHistogram**: Added High Dynamic Range Histogram
-     latency measurements based on the new capability in TRex traffic
-     generator. HDRH latency data presented in latency packet
-     percentile graphs and in detailed results tables.
-
-   - **Mellanox MCX556A-EDAT tests**: Added tests with Mellanox
-     ConnectX5-2p100GE NICs in 2n-clx testbeds using VPP native rdma
-     driver.
-
-   - **IPsec reconfiguration tests**: Added tests measuring the impact
-     of IPsec tunnels creations and removals.
-
-   - **Load Balancer tests**: Added VPP performance tests for Maglev,
-     L3DSR (Direct Server Return), Layer 4 Load Balancing NAT Mode.
+   - **Intel Xeon Ice Lake**: Performance test data for these platforms
+     continues to be provided by external Intel benchmarking labs
+     executing |csit-release| tests. For details about the physical
+     setup see :ref:`tested_physical_topologies`.
 
-#. TEST FRAMEWORK
+   - **AWS EC2 c5n**: Performance test data for AWS c5n instances has
+     been added to report for ip4, ip6 and ipsec tests.
+
+   - **Reduction of tests**: Removed certain test variations executed
+     iteratively for the report (as well as in daily and weekly
+     trending) due to physical testbeds overload.
 
-   - **CSIT Python3 support**: Full migration of CSIT from Python2.7 to
-     Python3.6. This change includes library migration, PIP dependency
-     upgrade, CSIT container images, infrastructure packages
-     ugrade/installation.
+#. TEST FRAMEWORK
 
-   - **CSIT PAPI support**: Finished conversion of CSIT VAT L1 keywords
-     to PAPI L1 KWs in CSIT using VPP Python bindings (VPP PAPI).
-     Redesign of key components of PAPI Socket Executor and PAPI
-     history. Due to issues with PAPI performance, VAT is still used
-     in CSIT for all VPP scale tests. See known issues below.
+   - **CSIT test environment** version has been updated to ver. 8, see
+     :ref:`test_environment_versioning`.
 
-   - **Test Suite Generator**: Added capability to generate suites for
-     different drivers per NIC model including DPDK, AVF, RDMA.
-     Extended coverage for all tests.
+   - **CSIT in AWS environment**: Completed CSIT automation support for
+     AWS c5n instances environment, including weekly performance 
+     trending tests execution.
 
-   - **General Code Housekeeping**: Ongoing RF keywords optimizations,
-     removal of redundant RF keywords and aligning of suite/test
-     setup/teardowns.
+   - **CSIT PAPI support**: Due to issues with PAPI performance, and
+     deprecation of VAT, CLI is used in CSIT for many VPP scale tests.
+     See known issues below.
 
+   - **General Code Housekeeping**: Ongoing code optimizations and bug
+     fixes.
 
 #. PRESENTATION AND ANALYTICS LAYER
 
-   - **Graphs layout improvements**: Improved performance graphs layout
-     for better readibility and maintenance: test grouping, axis
-     labels, descriptions, other informative decoration.
-
-   - **Latency graphs**: Min/Avg/Max group bar latency graphs are
-     replaced with packet latency percentile distributon at different
-     background packet loads based on TRex latency hdrhistogram
-     measurements.
-
-..
-    // Alternative Note for 1st Bullet when bad microcode Skx, Clx results are published
-    - **Intel Xeon 2n-skx, 3n-skx and 2n-clx testbeds**: VPP performance
-      test data is included in this report version, but it shows lower
-      performance and behaviour inconsistency of these systems
-      following the upgrade of processor microcode packages (skx ucode
-      0x2000064, clx ucode 0x500002c) as part of updating Ubuntu 18.04
-      LTS kernel version. Tested VPP and DPDK applications (L3fwd) are
-      affected. Skx and Clx test data will be corrected in subsequent
-      maintenance report version(s) once the issue is resolved. See
-      :ref:`vpp_known_issues`.
+   - **Graphs improvements**: Updated Packet Latency graphs,
+     see :ref:`latency_methodology`.
 
 .. raw:: latex
 
@@ -106,31 +55,42 @@ List of known issues in |csit-release| for VPP performance tests:
 +----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
 | #  | JiraID                                  | Issue Description                                                                                         |
 +====+=========================================+===========================================================================================================+
-| 1  | `CSIT-570                               | Sporadic (1 in 200) NDR discovery test failures on x520. DPDK reporting rx-errors, indicating L1 issue.   |
-|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-570>`_  | Suspected issue with HW combination of X710-X520 in LF testbeds. Not observed outside of LF testbeds.     |
+|  1 | `CSIT-1782                              | Multicore AVF tests are failing when trying to create interface. The issue persists after FVL FW upgrade. |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1782>`_ |                                                                                                           |
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+|  2 | `CSIT-1763                              | Adapt ramp-up phase of nat44 tests for different frame sizes.                                             |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1763>`_ | Currently ramp-up phase rate and duration values are correctly set for tests with 64B frame size.         |
 +----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
-| 2  | `VPP-662                                | 9000B packets not supported by NICs VIC1227 and VIC1387.                                                  |
-|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/VPP-662>`_   |                                                                                                           |
+|  3 | `CSIT-1671                              | All CSIT scale tests can not use PAPI due to much slower performance compared to VAT/CLI (it takes much   |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1671>`_ | longer to program VPP). This needs to be addressed on the PAPI side.                                      |
+|    +-----------------------------------------+ The usual PAPI library spends too much time parsing arguments, so even with async processing (hundreds of |
+|    | `VPP-1763                               | commands in flight over socket), the VPP configuration for large scale tests (millions of messages) takes |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/VPP-1763>`_  | too long.                                                                                                 |
 +----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
-| 3  | `CSIT-1498                              | Memif tests are sporadically failing on initialization of memif connection.                               |
-|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1498>`_ |                                                                                                           |
+|  4 | `CSIT-1789                              | AVF driver does not perform RSS in a deterministic way.                                                   |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1789>`_ | This increases standard deviation of tests with small number of flows (mainly ipsec).                     |
 +----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
-| 4  | `VPP-1677                               | 9000B ip4 nat44: VPP crash + coredump.                                                                    |
-|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/VPP-1677>`_  | VPP crashes very often in case that NAT44 is configured and it has to process IP4 jumbo frames (9000B).   |
+|  5 | `CSIT-1780                              | IPSEC SW async scheduler MRR tests failing with no traffic forwarded.                                     |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1780>`_ |                                                                                                           |
 +----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
-| 5  | `CSIT-1591                              | All CSIT scale tests can not use PAPI due to much slower performance compared to VAT/CLI (it takes much   |
-|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1499>`_ | longer to program VPP). This needs to be addressed on the PAPI side.                                      |
-|    +-----------------------------------------+                                                                                                           |
-|    | `VPP-1763                               |                                                                                                           |
-|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/VPP-1763>`_  |                                                                                                           |
+|  6 | `CSIT-1786                              | IP4 and IP6 scale tests failing with no traffic forwarded.                                                |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1786>`_ | Issue reported to VPP devs.                                                                               |
 +----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
-| 6  | `VPP-1675                               | IPv4 IPSEC 9000B packet tests are failing as no packet is forwarded.                                      |
-|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/VPP-1675>`_  | Reason: chained buffers are not supported.                                                                |
+|  7 | `CSIT-1785                              | NAT44ED tests failing to establish all TCP sessions.                                                      |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1785>`_ |                                                                                                           |
 +----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
-| 7  | `CSIT-1593                              | IPv4 AVF 9000B packet tests are failing on 3n-skx while passing on 2n-skx.                                |
-|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1593>`_ |                                                                                                           |
+|  8 | `CSIT-1791                              | Performance regression in RDMA tests, due to CSIT environment changes.                                    |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1791>`_ |                                                                                                           |
 +----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
-| 8  | `CSIT-1675                              | Intel Xeon 2n-skx, 3n-skx and 2n-clx testbeds behaviour and performance became inconsistent following     |
-|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1675>`_ | the upgrade to the latest Ubuntu 18.04 LTS kernel version (4.15.0-72-generic) and associated microcode    |
-|    |                                         | packages (skx ucode 0x2000064, clx ucode 0x500002c). VPP as well as DPDK L3fwd tests are affected.        |
+
+Root Cause Analysis for Performance Changes
+-------------------------------------------
+
+List of RCAs in |csit-release| for VPP performance changes:
+
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+| #  | JiraID                                  | Issue Description                                                                                         |
++====+=========================================+===========================================================================================================+
+|  1 | `VPP-1972                               | One VPP change has decreased performance of NAT44ed processing, mostly slow path.                         |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/VPP-1972>`_  |                                                                                                           |
 +----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+