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Benchmarking

This documentation explains how to benchmark a MediaServer to get the maximum viewers that can be handled. The benchmarking tool is based on Locust.

Prerequisite

  • Envsetup and ansible Help to get envsetup.
  • An SSH access to the machines that will be used to make requests on MediaServer (you can use the workers for that).
  • A media to test. You can create an empty live stream for the test. If you use a live page, you will have to set the status of the live to "ongoing".

Note that the machines used by the benchmarker must have an access to UbiCast packages (to get the ubicast-benchmark package).

Inventory

Create a new inventory with following configuration.

Hosts file

This file should be located in <your inventory>/hosts.

[bench_server]
worker1.test.com

[bench_worker]
worker2.test.com

The system targetted with bench_server will host the Locust server. This system must be unique.

The systems targetted with bench_worker will host the Locust workers. Multiple workers can be used.

Group vars

This file should be located in <your inventory>/group_vars/all.yml.

bench_host: <MediaServer URL. Example: "msauto.ubicast.net">
bench_oid: <Media OID. Example: "l125f58fbb8c655nth76">
bench_user: <MediaServer account username. Can be empty if the media access is not protected. Example: "test">
bench_password: <MediaServer account password. Can be empty if the media access is not protected. Example: "pwd">
bench_host_api_key: <MediaServer master API key>

Install the benchmarker

# ansible-playbook -i inventories/<your inventory> playbooks/bench.yml

Start the benchmarker

Disable anti-ddos in MediaServer Nginx configuration (usually in /etc/nginx/conf.d/limits.conf).

If the server hosting the bench server is using a firewall, disable it to be able to access the locust interface. For example, if ferm is installed: systemctl ferm stop.

Launch the test stream on the bench server, using the docker container : cd /usr/share/ms-testing-suite && make run_live

Or directly by hand : /usr/share/ms-testing-suite/ms_live_streamer.py /etc/mediaserver/bench-streaming.conf

Go with your browser on http://<bench_server>:8089. You might have to use an SSH tunnel to access this port.

Set the number of viewers and the hatch rate (usually the hatch rate is 10% of the viewers count) and start the bench.

Watch for /var/log/access.log (warning: this file is buffered by default, you can disable buffer in nginx.conf).