This topic explains how to install and run the Visual Statistics Display (VSD) for use with VMware Tanzu GemFire. Use the VSD tool to load statistics files and maintain the view that you want on your statistics.
This topic lists the Visual Statistics Display (VSD) requirements for use with Tanzu GemFire.
VSD works on Linux, macOS, and Windows platforms.
64-Bit Platform Support
VSD is a 32-bit application. If you are running VSD on a 64-bit operating system, you may need to install 32-bit OS libraries to run the application if they are not already installed. On Linux, to find out which libraries are missing you can try running the following:
ldd <product_dir>/tools/vsd/bin/vsdwishLinux
For 64-bit Windows, you can modify the scripts and executables as described in the note below.
Windows 7 and Later Support
To use VSD on Windows 7 and later, perform the following steps:
GEMFIREPRODUCTDIR\tools\vsd\bin\
directory, where GEMFIREPRODUCTDIR
is the location where you installed GemFire.bin
directory.VSD is available for download from the Broadcom Customer Support Portal.
It can be installed anywhere, but if GemFire is installed in product-dir, you may wish to install VSD in product-dir/tools/vsd
so it can be conveniently launched from gfsh
using the start vsd
command.
For this example, assume the VSD was downloaded, unzipped, and installed in product-dir/tools/vsd
.
Note: VSD is a 32-bit application. If you are running VSD on a 64-bit machine, you may need to install 32-bit OS libraries to run the application if they are not already installed. On Linux, to find out which libraries are missing, run the following ldd
command:
ldd <product_dir>/tools/vsd/bin/vsdwishLinux
The VSD tool installation has two subdirectories, bin and lib:
bin. Contains scripts and binaries that can be used to run VSD on a variety of operating systems, including:
lib. The jars and binary libraries needed to run VSD.
Before you use VSD, you must enable the collection of GemFire statistics at runtime. Set the following configurations in gemfire.properties:
statistic-sampling-enabled=true
statistic-archive-file=myStats.gfs
Since collecting statistics at the default sampling rate of once every second does not affect performance, we recommend that sampling should always be enabled; including during development, testing, and in production.
There is a special category of statistics called time-based statistics that can be very useful in troubleshooting and assessing the performance of some GemFire operations, but they should be used with caution because their collection can affect performance. These statistics can be enabled using the following gemfire.properties configuration:
enable-time-statistics=true
When the distributed system is up and running, every GemFire instance generates a statistics file. To simplify browsing these statistics in VSD, you may want to copy all the statistics files from all members into one directory so that you can easily load the files into VSD.
To start VSD, you can either execute the scripts directly or start it through the gfsh
interface. To start VSD using the provided scripts, change directories to product-dir/tools/vsd/bin
and the enter the following command at the prompt:
Windows:
prompt>vsd.bat
Note: To run VSD on Windows 7 or later, go to the product-dir/tools/vsd/bin
directory. Right-click on vsd.bat
and select Properties. Click Compatibility and set it to Windows XP. Repeat this step for all other executables in the bin
directory.
Linux/Unix, MacOS or Other OS:
$ vsd
To start VSD using gfsh
, start a gfsh
prompt and enter the following command:
gfsh>start vsd
You have several options for loading a statistics file into VSD:
Include the name of one or more statistics files on the VSD command line. Example:
vsd <filename.gfs> ...
Browse for an existing statistics file through Main > Load Data File.
After you load the data file, the VSD main window displays a list of entities for which statistics are available. VSD uses color to distinguish between entities that are still running (shown in green) and those that have stopped (shown in black).
If you select the menu item File > Auto Update, VSD automatically updates your display, and any associated charts, whenever the data file changes. Alternatively, you can choose File > Update periodically to update the display manually.
Some statistics are cumulative from when the GemFire system was started. Other statistics are instantaneous values that may change in any way between sample collection.
Cumulative statistics are best charted per second or per sample, so that the VSD chart is readable. Absolute values are best charted as No Filter.
When opening a .gfs file, statistics are shown in the time zone used on the local computer where VSD is launched. This can made it harder to relate log files to statistics if the logs are from another time zone.
To open a VSD file with the time zone used when generating it, first you need to know in which time zone the .gfs file is created. To obtain this information, use the following command:
strings file.gfs | head
For example:
$ strings ObjLoader?-31-03.gfs | head
Hongkong
hklp162p.oocl.com
:GemFire? x.x.x
14:46:33 PST
Linux x.x.x
After you obtain the time zone, modify your local computer to use the time zone used when obtaining statistics in the .gfs file. For example, on a Mac computer, you can first list available time zones:
sudo systemsetup -listtimezones
And then export the specific timezone to your environment:
export TZ=<timezone>
For example, for Hong Kong:
export TZ=Asia/Hong_Kong
Then use VSD to open the .gfs file that will now display timestamps from the original time zone.