report: update to vpp performance release notes
[csit.git] / docs / report / vpp_performance_tests / csit_release_notes.rst
index da25ef6..4f986eb 100644 (file)
+.. _vpp_performance_tests_release_notes:
+
 Release Notes
 =============
 
 Changes in |csit-release|
 -------------------------
 
-#. **VPP performance tests**
-
-   - *MRR tests* - Maximum Receive Rate tests measure the packet forwarding rate
-     under the maximum load offered by traffic generator over a set trial
-     duration, regardless of packet loss. MRR tests are used for continuous
-     performance trending and for comparison between releases.
-
-   - *MLR tests* - NDR and PDR tests measure the packet forwarding rate using
-     MLRsearch library by traffic generator. All tests that previously used
-     binary search were converted to MLRsearch.
-
-   - *L2patch tests* - Tests measure performance of L2patch, cross linking
-     RX and TX of two physical interfaces.
-
-   - *2-node tests* - Baseline set of 2-node tests covering base ip4, ip4,
-     l2patch, l2bd, l2xc.
-
-   - *Generated tests* - Simplified and unified test structure,
-     semi-autogenerated by generator script. Test generator is currently able
-     to create test combinations with various frame size and cores combinations.
-     All existing test cases were converted to new format.
-
-   - *Simultaneous multithreading* - SMT-aware automatic detection and
-     resource configuration including thread affinity, number of rx queues and
-     DPDK I/O mbufs. Tests are automatically tagged during execution indicating
-     configuration.
-
-  - *Intel Skylake* - Topologies consisting of 2-node and 3-node using
-    SuperMirco servers each equipped with two Intel Xeon Skylake Platinum
-    processors.
-
-#. **Presentation and Analytics Layer**
-
-   - *Performance trending* - Added continuous performance trending and
-     analysis. New Performance Trending and Performance Analysis jobs
-     executed regular throughput tests, with results being subsequently
-     analysed and trend and anomalies summarized and presented in VPP
-     Performance Dashboard and trendline graphs.
-
-#. **Test Framework Optimizations**
-
-   - *Performance tests efficiency* - Qemu build/install optimizations,
-     warmup phase handling, vpp restart handling. Resulted in improved
-     stability and reduced total execution time by 30% for single pkt
-     size e.g. 64B/78B.
-
-   - *General code housekeeping* - ongoing RF keywords optimizations,
-     removal of redundant RF keywords.
-
-Performance Changes
--------------------
-
-Relative performance changes in measured packet throughput in |csit-release|
-are calculated against the results from |csit-release-1|
-report. Listed mean and standard deviation values are computed based on
-a series of the same tests executed against respective VPP releases to
-verify test results repeatability, with percentage change calculated for
-mean values. Note that the standard deviation is quite high for a small
-number of packet throughput tests, what indicates poor test results
-repeatability and makes the relative change of mean throughput value not
-fully representative for these tests. The root causes behind poor
-results repeatability vary between the test cases.
-
-NDR Changes
-~~~~~~~~~~~
-
-NDR throughput changes between releases are available in a
-CSV and pretty ASCII formats:
-
-  - `csv format for 1t1c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-1t1c-ndr.csv>`_,
-  - `csv format for 2t2c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-2t2c-ndr.csv>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for 1t1c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-1t1c-ndr.txt>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for 2t2c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-2t2c-ndr.txt>`_.
-
-.. note::
-
-    Test results have been generated by
-    `FD.io test executor vpp performance job 3n-hsw`_,
-    with Robot Framework result
-    files csit-vpp-perf-|srelease|-\*.zip
-    `archived here <../_static/archive/>`_.
-
-PDR Changes
-~~~~~~~~~~~
-
-PDR throughput changes between releases are available in a
-CSV and pretty ASCII formats:
-
-  - `csv format for 1t1c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-1t1c-pdr.csv>`_,
-  - `csv format for 2t2c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-2t2c-pdr.csv>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for 1t1c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-1t1c-pdr.txt>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for 2t2c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-2t2c-pdr.txt>`_.
-
-.. note::
-
-    Test results have been generated by
-    `FD.io test executor vpp performance job 3n-hsw`_,
-    with Robot Framework result
-    files csit-vpp-perf-|srelease|-\*.zip
-    `archived here <../_static/archive/>`_.
-
-MRR Changes
-~~~~~~~~~~~
-
-MRR small packet throughput changes between releases are available in a
-CSV and pretty ASCII formats:
-
-  - `csv format for 1t1c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-1t1c-mrr.csv>`_,
-  - `csv format for 2t2c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-2t2c-mrr.csv>`_,
-  - `csv format for 4t4c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-4t4c-mrr.csv>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for 1t1c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-1t1c-mrr.txt>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for 2t2c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-2t2c-mrr.txt>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for 4t4c <../_static/vpp/performance-changes-4t4c-mrr.txt>`_.
-
-.. note::
-
-    Test results have been generated by
-    `FD.io test executor vpp performance job 3n-hsw`_,
-    with Robot Framework result
-    files csit-vpp-perf-|srelease|-\*.zip
-    `archived here <../_static/archive/>`_.
-
-Comparison Across Testbeds
---------------------------
-
-Relative performance changes in measured packet throughputon 3-Node Skx testbed
-are calculated against the results measured on 3-Node Hsw testbed.
-
-NDR Changes
-~~~~~~~~~~~
-
-NDR changes between testbeds are available in a
-CSV and pretty ASCII formats:
-
-  - `csv format for ndr <../_static/vpp/performance-compare-testbeds-3n-hsw-3n-skx-ndr.csv>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for ndr <../_static/vpp/performance-compare-testbeds-3n-hsw-3n-skx-ndr.txt>`_.
-
-.. note::
-
-    Test results have been generated by
-    `FD.io test executor vpp performance job 3n-hsw`_ and
-    `FD.io test executor vpp performance job 3n-skx`_
-    with Robot Framework result
-    files csit-vpp-perf-|srelease|-\*.zip
-    `archived here <../_static/archive/>`_.
-
-PDR Changes
-~~~~~~~~~~~
-
-PDR throughput changes between testbeds are available in a
-CSV and pretty ASCII formats:
+#. VPP PERFORMANCE TESTS
 
-  - `csv format for pdr <../_static/vpp/performance-compare-testbeds-3n-hsw-3n-skx-pdr.csv>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for pdr <../_static/vpp/performance-compare-testbeds-3n-hsw-3n-skx-pdr.txt>`_.
+   - **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`.
 
-.. note::
+   - **AWS EC2 c5n**: Performance test data for AWS c5n instances has
+     been added to report for ip4, ip6 and ipsec tests.
 
-    Test results have been generated by
-    `FD.io test executor vpp performance job 3n-hsw`_ and
-    `FD.io test executor vpp performance job 3n-skx`_
-    with Robot Framework result
-    files csit-vpp-perf-|srelease|-\*.zip
-    `archived here <../_static/archive/>`_.
+   - **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.
 
-MRR Changes
-~~~~~~~~~~~
+#. TEST FRAMEWORK
 
-MRR throughput changes between testbeds are available in a
-CSV and pretty ASCII formats:
+   - **CSIT test environment** version has been updated to ver. 8, see
+     :ref:`test_environment_versioning`.
 
-  - `csv format for mrr <../_static/vpp/performance-compare-testbeds-3n-hsw-3n-skx-mrr.csv>`_,
-  - `pretty ASCII format for mrr <../_static/vpp/performance-compare-testbeds-3n-hsw-3n-skx-mrr.txt>`_.
+   - **CSIT in AWS environment**: Completed CSIT automation support for
+     AWS c5n instances environment, including weekly performance 
+     trending tests execution.
 
-.. note::
+   - **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.
 
-    Test results have been generated by
-    `FD.io test executor vpp performance job 3n-hsw`_ and
-    `FD.io test executor vpp performance job 3n-skx`_
-    with Robot Framework result
-    files csit-vpp-perf-|srelease|-\*.zip
-    `archived here <../_static/archive/>`_.
+   - **General Code Housekeeping**: Ongoing code optimizations and bug
+     fixes.
 
-Throughput Trending
--------------------
+#. PRESENTATION AND ANALYTICS LAYER
 
-In addition to reporting throughput changes between VPP releases, CSIT
-provides continuous performance trending for VPP master branch:
+   - **Graphs improvements**: Updated Packet Latency graphs,
+     see :ref:`latency_methodology`.
 
-#. `VPP Performance Dashboard <https://docs.fd.io/csit/master/trending/introduction/index.html>`_
-   - per VPP test case throughput trend, trend compliance and summary of
-   detected anomalies.
+.. raw:: latex
 
-#. `Trending Methodology <https://docs.fd.io/csit/master/trending/methodology/index.html>`_
-   - throughput test metrics, trend calculations and anomaly
-   classification (progression, regression, outlier).
+    \clearpage
 
-#. `Trendline Graphs <https://docs.fd.io/csit/master/trending/trending/index.html>`_
-   - per VPP build MRR throughput measurements against the trendline
-   with anomaly highlights, with associated CSIT test jobs.
+.. _vpp_known_issues:
 
 Known Issues
 ------------
 
 List of known issues in |csit-release| for VPP performance tests:
 
-+---+-------------------------------------------------+------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
-| # | Issue                                           | Jira ID    | Description                                                     |
-+===+=================================================+============+=================================================================+
-| 1 | Sporadic (1 in 200) NDR discovery test failures | CSIT-570   | DPDK reporting rx-errors, indicating L1 issue. Suspected issue  |
-|   | on x520.                                        |            | with HW combination of X710-X520 in LF testbeds. Not observed   |
-|   |                                                 |            | outside of LF testbeds.                                         |
-+---+-------------------------------------------------+------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
-| 2 | High failure rate of api call                   | VPP-1361   | Failure rate: 30-40% of tests failing due to interfaces not     |
-|   | sw_interface_set_flags [admin-up|link-up]       |            | in link-up state after API call sw_interface_set_flags.         |
-+---+-------------------------------------------------+------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
-| 3 | Scale IPSecHW Interface mode throughput         | CSIT-1234  | IPSec throughput regression: NDR -28%..-31%, PDR -28%..-31%,    |
-|   | regression.                                     |            | MRR -40%. Affects IPSec HW Scale 1000tnl tests with Int mode.   |
-+---+-------------------------------------------------+------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+| #  | JiraID                                  | Issue Description                                                                                         |
++====+=========================================+===========================================================================================================+
+|  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.         |
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+|  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.                                                                                                 |
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+|  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).                     |
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+|  5 | `CSIT-1780                              | IPSEC SW async scheduler MRR tests failing with no traffic forwarded.                                     |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1780>`_ |                                                                                                           |
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+|  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.                                                                               |
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+|  7 | `CSIT-1785                              | NAT44ED tests failing to establish all TCP sessions.                                                      |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1785>`_ |                                                                                                           |
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+|  8 | `CSIT-1791                              | Performance regression in RDMA tests, due to CSIT environment changes.                                    |
+|    | <https://jira.fd.io/browse/CSIT-1791>`_ |                                                                                                           |
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+
+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>`_  |                                                                                                           |
++----+-----------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+