How to measure performance?

[David Collier-Brown]

Danila Vologdin  wrote:
| My problem that I don't know a good practical way
| to measure performance of my system
| I need fileserver for Win9x machines with files share with dos
| applications
| Friendly speaking I need to choose between WinNT and Linux

	The "best" way is to use a real-world load in a test
	of both NT and Linux/Samba. Plan on spending about
	a man-week, spread out over two or more calendar weeks...


	To start, look at what the existing users
	are doing, record the file transfers involved, and then
	write a little script to reproduce the load.

	I assume they use local filesystems, so you can just
	sit there and watch a heavy user and write down the time
	and filename. After observing for a reasonable period
	(10 minutes, and hour, a day???), look to see how big
	the files were and make a script to use smbclient
	to get them at the recorded intervals.

	Now amend the script so you can run multiple copies
	of it (i.e., each script uses a different set of files)
	and run it against both an NT and a Linux/Samba server
	while recording the response time and kb/sec for each file.
	
	Increase the number of scripts until the response time
	starts to increase rapidly towards a value the users
	wouldn't like and write it up for your management.

--dave
[Feel free to send me email: I do this sort of thing for a living]
-- 
David Collier-Brown,  | Always do right. This will gratify some people
185 Ellerslie Ave.,   | and astonish the rest.        -- Mark Twain
Willowdale, Ontario   | http://java.science.yorku.ca/~davecb
Work: (905) 415-2849 Home: (416) 223-8968 Email: davecb at canada.sun.com