Artificial Intelligence
Performance overview and validation in AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP
Suggest changes
PDFs
A Kafka cluster with the storage layer mounted on NetApp NFS was benchmarked for performance in the AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP. The benchmarking examples are described in the following sections.
Apache Kafka in AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP
Network File System (NFS) is a widely used network filesystem for storing large amounts of data. In most organizations data is increasingly being generated by streaming applications like Apache Kafka. These workloads require scalability, low latency, and a robust data ingestion architecture with modern storage capabilities. To enable real-time analytics and to provide actionable insights, a well designed and highly performant infrastructure is required.
Kafka by design works with POSIX compliant file system and relies on the file system to handle file operations, but when storing data on an NFSv3 file system, the Kafka broker NFS client can interpret file operations differently from a local file system like XFS or Ext4. A common example is the NFS Silly rename which caused Kafka brokers to fail when expanding clusters and re-allocating partitions. To deal with this challenge NetApp has updated the open-source Linux NFS client with changes now generally available in RHEL8.7, RHEL9.1, and supported from the current FSx for NetApp ONTAP release, ONTAP 9.12.1.
Amazon FSx for NetApp ONTAP provides a fully managed, scalable, and highly performance NFS file system in the cloud. Kafka data on FSx for NetApp ONTAP can scale to handle large amounts of data and ensure fault tolerance. NFS provides centralized storage management and data protection for critical and sensitive datasets.
These enhancements make it possible for AWS customer to take advantage of FSx for NetApp ONTAP when running Kafka workloads on AWS compute services. These benefits are:
* Reducing CPU utilization to reduce the I/O wait time
* Faster Kafka broker recovery time.
* Reliability and efficiency.
* Scalability and performance.
* Multi-Availability Zone availability.
* Data protection.
Performance overview and validation in AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP
A Kafka cluster with the storage layer mounted on NetApp NFS was benchmarked for performance in the AWS cloud. The benchmarking examples are described in the following sections.
Kafka in AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP
A Kafka cluster with AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP was benchmarked for performance in the AWS cloud. This benchmarking is described in the following sections.
Architectural setup
The following table shows the environmental configuration for a Kafka cluster using AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP.
| Platform component | Environment configuration |
|---|---|
Kafka 3.2.3 |
|
Operating system on all nodes |
RHEL8.6 |
AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP |
Multi-AZ with 4GB/Sec throughput and 160000 IOPS |
NetApp FSx for NetApp ONTAP setup
-
For our initial testing, we have created a FSx for NetApp ONTAP filesystem with 2TB of capacity and 40000 IOPs for 2GB/Sec throughput.
[root@ip-172-31-33-69 ~]# aws fsx create-file-system --region us-east-2 --storage-capacity 2048 --subnet-ids <desired subnet 1> subnet-<desired subnet 2> --file-system-type ONTAP --ontap-configuration DeploymentType=MULTI_AZ_HA_1,ThroughputCapacity=2048,PreferredSubnetId=<desired primary subnet>,FsxAdminPassword=<new password>,DiskIopsConfiguration="{Mode=USER_PROVISIONED,Iops=40000"}In our example, we are deploying FSx for NetApp ONTAP through the AWS CLI. You will need to customize the command further in your environment as needed. FSx for NetApp ONTAP can additionally be deployed and managed through the AWS Console for an easier and more streamlined deployment experience with less command line input.
Documentation In FSx for NetApp ONTAP, the max IOPS achievable for a 2GB/Sec throughput filesystem in our test region (US-East-1) is 80,000 iops. The total max iops for a FSx for NetApp ONTAP filesystem is 160,000 iops which requires a 4GB/Sec throughput deployment to achieve which we will demonstrate later in this document.
For more information on FSx for NetApp ONTAP performance specifications, please feel free to visit the AWS FSx for NetApp ONTAP documentation here: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/fsx/latest/ONTAPGuide/performance.html .
Detailed command line syntax for FSx “create-file-system" can be found here: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/reference/fsx/create-file-system.html
For instance, you can specify a specific KMS key as opposed to the default AWS FSx master key that is used when no KMS key is specified.
-
While creating the FSx for NetApp ONTAP filesystem, Wait till the “LifeCycle” status changes to “AVAILABLE” in your JSON return after describing your filesystem as follows:
[root@ip-172-31-33-69 ~]# aws fsx describe-file-systems --region us-east-1 --file-system-ids fs-02ff04bab5ce01c7c
-
Validate the credentials by login into Fsx for NetApp ONTAP SSH with the fsxadmin user:
Fsxadmin is the default admin account for FSx for NetApp ONTAP filesystems at creation. The password for fsxadmin is the password that was configured when first creating the filesystem either in the AWS Console or with the AWS CLI as we completed in Step 1.[root@ip-172-31-33-69 ~]# ssh fsxadmin@198.19.250.244 The authenticity of host '198.19.250.244 (198.19.250.244)' can't be established. ED25519 key fingerprint is SHA256:mgCyRXJfWRc2d/jOjFbMBsUcYOWjxoIky0ltHvVDL/Y. This key is not known by any other names Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no/[fingerprint])? yes Warning: Permanently added '198.19.250.244' (ED25519) to the list of known hosts. (fsxadmin@198.19.250.244) Password: This is your first recorded login.
-
Once your credentials have been validated, Create the storage Virtual Machine on the FSx for NetApp ONTAP filesystem
[root@ip-172-31-33-69 ~]# aws fsx --region us-east-1 create-storage-virtual-machine --name svmkafkatest --file-system-id fs-02ff04bab5ce01c7c
A Storage Virtual Machine (SVM) is an isolated file server with its own administrative credentials and endpoints for administering and accessing data in FSx for NetApp ONTAP volumes and provides FSx for NetApp ONTAP multi-tenancy.
-
Once you have configured your primary Storage Virtual Machine, SSH into the newly created FSx for NetApp ONTAP filesystem and create volumes in storage virtual machine using below sample command and similarly we create 6 volumes for this validation. Based on our validation, keep the default constituent (8) or less constituents which will provides better performance to kafka.
FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume create -volume kafkafsxN1 -state online -policy default -unix-permissions ---rwxr-xr-x -junction-active true -type RW -snapshot-policy none -junction-path /kafkafsxN1 -aggr-list aggr1
-
We will need additional capacity in our volumes for our testing. Extend the size of the volume to 2TB and mount on the junction path.
FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume size -volume kafkafsxN1 -new-size +2TB vol size: Volume "svmkafkatest:kafkafsxN1" size set to 2.10t. FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume size -volume kafkafsxN2 -new-size +2TB vol size: Volume "svmkafkatest:kafkafsxN2" size set to 2.10t. FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume size -volume kafkafsxN3 -new-size +2TB vol size: Volume "svmkafkatest:kafkafsxN3" size set to 2.10t. FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume size -volume kafkafsxN4 -new-size +2TB vol size: Volume "svmkafkatest:kafkafsxN4" size set to 2.10t. FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume size -volume kafkafsxN5 -new-size +2TB vol size: Volume "svmkafkatest:kafkafsxN5" size set to 2.10t. FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume size -volume kafkafsxN6 -new-size +2TB vol size: Volume "svmkafkatest:kafkafsxN6" size set to 2.10t. FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume show -vserver svmkafkatest -volume * Vserver Volume Aggregate State Type Size Available Used% --------- ------------ ------------ ---------- ---- ---------- ---------- ----- svmkafkatest kafkafsxN1 - online RW 2.10TB 1.99TB 0% svmkafkatest kafkafsxN2 - online RW 2.10TB 1.99TB 0% svmkafkatest kafkafsxN3 - online RW 2.10TB 1.99TB 0% svmkafkatest kafkafsxN4 - online RW 2.10TB 1.99TB 0% svmkafkatest kafkafsxN5 - online RW 2.10TB 1.99TB 0% svmkafkatest kafkafsxN6 - online RW 2.10TB 1.99TB 0% svmkafkatest svmkafkatest_root aggr1 online RW 1GB 968.1MB 0% 7 entries were displayed. FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume mount -volume kafkafsxN1 -junction-path /kafkafsxN1 FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume mount -volume kafkafsxN2 -junction-path /kafkafsxN2 FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume mount -volume kafkafsxN3 -junction-path /kafkafsxN3 FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume mount -volume kafkafsxN4 -junction-path /kafkafsxN4 FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume mount -volume kafkafsxN5 -junction-path /kafkafsxN5 FsxId02ff04bab5ce01c7c::*> volume mount -volume kafkafsxN6 -junction-path /kafkafsxN6In FSx for NetApp ONTAP, volumes can be thin provisioned. In our example, the total extended volume capacity exceeds total filesystem capacity so we will need to extend the total filesystem capacity in order to unlock additional provisioned volume capacity which we will demonstrate in our next step.
-
Next, for additional performance and capacity,We extend the FSx for NetApp ONTAP throughput capacity from 2GB/Sec to 4GB/Sec and IOPS to 160000, and capacity to 5 TB
[root@ip-172-31-33-69 ~]# aws fsx update-file-system --region us-east-1 --storage-capacity 5120 --ontap-configuration 'ThroughputCapacity=4096,DiskIopsConfiguration={Mode=USER_PROVISIONED,Iops=160000}' --file-system-id fs-02ff04bab5ce01c7cDetailed command line syntax for FSx “update-file-system" can be found here:
https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/reference/fsx/update-file-system.html -
The FSx for NetApp ONTAP volumes are mounted with nconnect and default opions in Kafka brokers
The following picture shows our final architecture of a our FSx for NetApp ONTAP based Kafka cluster:
-
Compute. We used a three-node Kafka cluster with a three-node zookeeper ensemble running on dedicated servers. Each broker had six NFS mount points to a six volumes on the FSx for NetApp ONTAP instance.
-
Monitoring. We used two nodes for a Prometheus-Grafana combination. For generating workloads, we used a separate three-node cluster that could produce and consume to this Kafka cluster.
-
Storage. We used an FSx for NetApp ONTAP with six 2TB volumes mounted. The volume was then exported to the Kafka broker with an NFS mount.The FSx for NetApp ONTAP volumes are mounted with 16 nconnect sessions and default options in Kafka brokers.
-
OpenMessage Benchmarking configurations.
We used the same configuration used for the NetApp Cloud volumes ONTAP and their details are here -
https://docs.netapp.com/us-en/netapp-solutions/data-analytics/kafka-nfs-performance-overview-and-validation-in-aws.html#architectural-setup
Methodology of testing
-
A Kafka cluster was provisioned as per the specification described above using terraform and ansible. Terraform is used to build the infrastructure using AWS instances for the Kafka cluster and ansible builds the Kafka cluster on them.
-
An OMB workload was triggered with the workload configuration described above and the Sync driver.
sudo bin/benchmark –drivers driver-kafka/kafka-sync.yaml workloads/1-topic-100-partitions-1kb.yaml
-
Another workload was triggered with the Throughput driver with same workload configuration.
sudo bin/benchmark –drivers driver-kafka/kafka-throughput.yaml workloads/1-topic-100-partitions-1kb.yaml
Observation
Two different types of drivers were used to generate workloads to benchmark the performance of a Kafka instance running on NFS. The difference between the drivers is the log flush property.
For a Kafka Replication factor 1 and the FSx for NetApp ONTAP:
-
Total throughput generated consistently by the Sync driver: ~ 3218 MBps and peak performance in ~ 3652 MBps.
-
Total throughput generated consistently by the Throughput driver: ~ 3679 MBps and peak performance in ~ 3908 MBps.
For Kafka with replication factor 3 and the FSx for NetApp ONTAP :
-
Total throughput generated consistently by the Sync driver: ~ 1252 MBps and peak performance in ~ 1382 MBps.
-
Total throughput generated consistently by the Throughput driver: ~ 1218 MBps and peak performance in ~ 1328 MBps.
In Kafka replication factor 3, the read and write operation happened three times on the FSx for NetApp ONTAP, In Kafka replication factor 1, the read and write operation is one time on the FSx for NetApp ONTAP, so in both validation, we able to reach the maximum throughput of 4GB/Sec.
The Sync driver can generate consistent throughput as logs are flushed to the disk instantly, whereas the Throughput driver generates bursts of throughput as logs are committed to disk in bulk.
These throughput numbers are generated for the given AWS configuration. For higher performance requirements, the instance types can be scaled up and tuned further for better throughput numbers. The total throughput or total rate is the combination of both producer and consumer rate.
The below chart shows the 2GB/Sec FSx for NetApp ONTAP and 4GB/Sec performance for Kafka replication factor 3. The replication factor 3 does the read and write operation three times on the FSx for NetApp ONTAP storage. The total rate for throughput driver is 881 MB/Sec, which does read and write Kafka operation approximately 2.64 GB/Sec on the 2GB/Sec FSx for NetApp ONTAP filesystem and total rate for throughput driver is 1328 MB/Sec that does read and write kafka operation approximately 3.98 GB/Sec. Ther Kafka performance is linear and scalable based on the FSx for NetApp ONTAP throughput.
The below chart shows the performance between EC2 instance vs FSx for NetApp ONTAP (Kafka Replication Factor : 3)
