bup-memtest(1) bup-memtest(1)
NAME
bup-memtest - test bup memory usage statistics
SYNOPSIS
bup memtest [options...]
DESCRIPTION
bup memtest opens the list of pack indexes in your bup repository, then
searches the list for a series of nonexistent objects, printing memory
usage statistics after each cycle.
Because of the way Unix systems work, the output will usually show a
large (and unchanging) value in the VmSize column, because mapping the
index files in the first place takes a certain amount of virtual address
space. However, this virtual memory usage is entirely virtual; it
doesn’t take any of your RAM. Over time, bup uses parts of the indexes,
which need to be loaded from disk, and this is what causes an increase
in the VmRSS column.
OPTIONS
-n, --number=number
set the number of objects to search for during each cycle (ie.
before printing a line of output)
-c, --cycles=cycles
set the number of cycles (ie. the number of lines of output af-
ter the first). The first line of output is always 0 (ie. the
baseline before searching for any objects).
--ignore-midx
ignore any .midx files created by bup midx. This allows you to
compare memory performance with and without using midx.
--existing
search for existing objects instead of searching for random
nonexistent ones. This can greatly affect memory usage and per-
formance. Note that most of the time, bup save spends most of
its time searching for nonexistent objects, since existing ones
are probably in unmodified files that we won’t be trying to back
up anyway. So the default behaviour reflects real bup perfor-
mance more accurately. But you might want this option anyway
just to make sure you haven’t made searching for existing objects
much worse than before.
EXAMPLES
$ bup memtest -n300 -c5
PackIdxList: using 1 index.
VmSize VmRSS VmData VmStk
0 20824 kB 4528 kB 1980 kB 84 kB
300 20828 kB 5828 kB 1984 kB 84 kB
600 20828 kB 6844 kB 1984 kB 84 kB
900 20828 kB 7836 kB 1984 kB 84 kB
1200 20828 kB 8736 kB 1984 kB 84 kB
1500 20828 kB 9452 kB 1984 kB 84 kB
$ bup memtest -n300 -c5 --ignore-midx
PackIdxList: using 361 indexes.
VmSize VmRSS VmData VmStk
0 27444 kB 6552 kB 2516 kB 84 kB
300 27448 kB 15832 kB 2520 kB 84 kB
600 27448 kB 17220 kB 2520 kB 84 kB
900 27448 kB 18012 kB 2520 kB 84 kB
1200 27448 kB 18388 kB 2520 kB 84 kB
1500 27448 kB 18556 kB 2520 kB 84 kB
DISCUSSION
When optimizing bup indexing, the first goal is to keep the VmRSS rea-
sonably low. However, it might eventually be necessary to swap in all
the indexes, simply because you’re searching for a lot of objects, and
this will cause your RSS to grow as large as VmSize eventually.
The key word here is eventually. As long as VmRSS grows reasonably
slowly, the amount of disk activity caused by accessing pack indexes is
reasonably small. If it grows quickly, bup will probably spend most of
its time swapping index data from disk instead of actually running your
backup, so backups will run very slowly.
The purpose of bup memtest is to give you an idea of how fast your mem-
ory usage is growing, and to help in optimizing bup for better memory
use. If you have memory problems you might be asked to send the output
of bup memtest to help diagnose the problems.
Tip: try using bup midx -a or bup midx -f to see if it helps reduce your
memory usage.
Trivia: index memory usage in bup (or git) is only really a problem when
adding a large number of previously unseen objects. This is because for
each object, we need to absolutely confirm that it isn’t already in the
database, which requires us to search through all the existing pack in-
dexes to ensure that none of them contain the object in question. In
the more obvious case of searching for objects that do exist, the ob-
jects being searched for are typically related in some way, which means
they probably all exist in a small number of packfiles, so memory usage
will be constrained to just those packfile indexes.
Since git users typically don’t add a lot of files in a single run, git
doesn’t really need a program like bup midx. bup, on the other hand,
spends most of its time backing up files it hasn’t seen before, so its
memory usage patterns are different.
SEE ALSO
bup-midx(1)
BUP
Part of the bup(1) suite.
AUTHORS
Avery Pennarun ]8;;mailto:apenwarr@gmail.com\apenwarr@gmail.com]8;;\
Bup 0.33.7 2025-01-11 bup-memtest(1)
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