Chapter 5. Using Cluster Loader
Cluster Loader is a tool that deploys large numbers of various objects to a cluster, which creates user-defined cluster objects. Build, configure, and run Cluster Loader to measure performance metrics of your OpenShift Container Platform deployment at various cluster states.
5.1. Installing Cluster Loader
Procedure
To pull the container image, run:
$ sudo podman pull quay.io/openshift/origin-tests:4.3
5.2. Running Cluster Loader
Prerequisites
- The repository will prompt you to authenticate. The registry credentials allow you to access the image, which is not publicly available. Use your existing authentication credentials from installation.
Procedure
Execute Cluster Loader using the built-in test configuration, which deploys five template builds and waits for them to complete:
$ sudo podman run -v ${LOCAL_KUBECONFIG}:/root/.kube/config:z -i \ quay.io/openshift/origin-tests:4.3 /bin/bash -c 'export KUBECONFIG=/root/.kube/config && \ openshift-tests run-test "[sig-scalability][Feature:Performance] Load cluster \ should populate the cluster [Slow][Serial] [Suite:openshift]"'
Alternatively, execute Cluster Loader with a user-defined configuration by setting the environment variable for
VIPERCONFIG
:$ sudo podman run -v ${LOCAL_KUBECONFIG}:/root/.kube/config:z \ -v ${LOCAL_CONFIG_FILE_PATH}:/root/configs/:z \ -i quay.io/openshift/origin-tests:4.3 \ /bin/bash -c 'KUBECONFIG=/root/.kube/config VIPERCONFIG=/root/configs/test.yaml \ openshift-tests run-test "[sig-scalability][Feature:Performance] Load cluster \ should populate the cluster [Slow][Serial] [Suite:openshift]"'
In this example,
${LOCAL_KUBECONFIG}
refers to the path to thekubeconfig
on your local file system. Also, there is a directory called${LOCAL_CONFIG_FILE_PATH}
, which is mounted into the container that contains a configuration file calledtest.yaml
. Additionally, if thetest.yaml
references any external template files or podspec files, they should also be mounted into the container.
5.3. Configuring Cluster Loader
The tool creates multiple namespaces (projects), which contain multiple templates or Pods.
5.3.1. Example Cluster Loader configuration file
Cluster Loader’s configuration file is a basic YAML file:
provider: local 1 ClusterLoader: cleanup: true projects: - num: 1 basename: clusterloader-cakephp-mysql tuning: default ifexists: reuse templates: - num: 1 file: cakephp-mysql.json - num: 1 basename: clusterloader-dancer-mysql tuning: default ifexists: reuse templates: - num: 1 file: dancer-mysql.json - num: 1 basename: clusterloader-django-postgresql tuning: default ifexists: reuse templates: - num: 1 file: django-postgresql.json - num: 1 basename: clusterloader-nodejs-mongodb tuning: default ifexists: reuse templates: - num: 1 file: quickstarts/nodejs-mongodb.json - num: 1 basename: clusterloader-rails-postgresql tuning: default templates: - num: 1 file: rails-postgresql.json tuningsets: 2 - name: default pods: stepping: 3 stepsize: 5 pause: 0 s rate_limit: 4 delay: 0 ms
- 1
- Optional setting for end-to-end tests. Set to
local
to avoid extra log messages. - 2
- The tuning sets allow rate limiting and stepping, the ability to create several batches of Pods while pausing in between sets. Cluster Loader monitors completion of the previous step before continuing.
- 3
- Stepping will pause for
M
seconds after eachN
objects are created. - 4
- Rate limiting will wait
M
milliseconds between the creation of objects.
This example assumes that references to any external template files or podspec files are also mounted into the container.
If you are running Cluster Loader on Microsoft Azure, then you must set the AZURE_AUTH_LOCATION
variable to a file that contains the output of terraform.azure.auto.tfvars.json
, which is present in the installer directory.
5.3.2. Configuration fields
Field | Description |
---|---|
|
Set to |
|
A sub-object with one or many definition(s). Under |
|
A sub-object with one definition per configuration. |
| An optional sub-object with one definition per configuration. Adds synchronization possibilities during object creation. |
Field | Description |
---|---|
| An integer. One definition of the count of how many projects to create. |
|
A string. One definition of the base name for the project. The count of identical namespaces will be appended to |
| A string. One definition of what tuning set you want to apply to the objects, which you deploy inside this namespace. |
|
A string containing either |
| A list of key-value pairs. The key is the ConfigMap name and the value is a path to a file from which you create the ConfigMap. |
| A list of key-value pairs. The key is the secret name and the value is a path to a file from which you create the secret. |
| A sub-object with one or many definition(s) of Pods to deploy. |
| A sub-object with one or many definition(s) of templates to deploy. |
Field | Description |
---|---|
| An integer. The number of Pods or templates to deploy. |
| A string. The docker image URL to a repository where it can be pulled. |
| A string. One definition of the base name for the template (or pod) that you want to create. |
| A string. The path to a local file, which is either a PodSpec or template to be created. |
|
Key-value pairs. Under |
Field | Description |
---|---|
| A string. The name of the tuning set which will match the name specified when defining a tuning in a project. |
|
A sub-object identifying the |
|
A sub-object identifying the |
Field | Description |
---|---|
| A sub-object. A stepping configuration used if you want to create an object in a step creation pattern. |
| A sub-object. A rate-limiting tuning set configuration to limit the object creation rate. |
Field | Description |
---|---|
| An integer. How many objects to create before pausing object creation. |
|
An integer. How many seconds to pause after creating the number of objects defined in |
| An integer. How many seconds to wait before failure if the object creation is not successful. |
| An integer. How many milliseconds (ms) to wait between creation requests. |
Field | Description |
---|---|
|
A sub-object with |
|
A boolean. Wait for Pods with labels matching |
|
A boolean. Wait for Pods with labels matching |
|
A list of selectors to match Pods in |
|
A string. The synchronization timeout period to wait for Pods in |
5.4. Known issues
- Cluster Loader fails when called without configuration. (BZ#1761925)
If the
IDENTIFIER
parameter is not defined in user templates, template creation fails witherror: unknown parameter name "IDENTIFIER"
. If you deploy templates, add this parameter to your template to avoid this error:{ "name": "IDENTIFIER", "description": "Number to append to the name of resources", "value": "1" }
If you deploy Pods, adding the parameter is unnecessary.