[erlang-questions] fast file sending - erlang & nginx

[Rapsey]

I've done quite a bit of testing on this stuff and the end conclusion is
that gen_tcp:send is simply slow. It uses way to much CPU than it should and
I don't know why. I tried looking at the inet_drv.c stuff, but there is just
to much code in there.
Since my work involves writing a streaming server and throughput is king. I
gave up on gen_tcp and just implemented my own socket driver and later
turned into a NIF (more flexible and general use). It's fast as hell now.


Sergej

On Sun, Nov 21, 2010 at 11:52 AM, Roberto Ostinelli <roberto@REDACTED>wrote:

> dear list,
>
> i've just made a basic test to measure the sending of a small file
> (5080 bytes) via http, using erlang and nginx. code for erlang's file
> sending is appended here below. the results from ab benchmarks on an
> ubuntu box show that the throughput of nginx is around 5 times the one
> i can reach with erlang.
>
> i've developed a fastcgi backend in erlang [soon to be released on
> github], and using it i can reach comparable [if not faster]
> throughtputs on it than the ones i can reach with nginx. so, the fact
> that erlang is slower in sending static files cannot be due to the
> http handling itself.
>
> i decided to investigate if this was due to I/O reading speed.
>
> i've seen that joel has done some research on this using NIF to
> replace the file reading module on couchdb with the fd.erl module and
> it's related NIFs
> [
> https://github.com/wagerlabs/couchdb/tree/23527eb8165f81e63d47b230f3297d3072c88d83/src/couchdb
> ],
> however if i'm not wrong i've seen that he is not using this module
> anymore, so i decided not test it.
>
> instead, i tried using the sendfile system call developed by steve
> vinosky sendfile_drv, packaged by tuncer
> [https://github.com/tuncer/sendfile], since in this way the file
> reading is anyway done by a fast C system call and i would be able to
> see if there are any differences. the results are that raw throughput
> remains around the same.
>
> therefore, i believe that the difference in throughput between nginx
> and this erlang code is not due to I/O issues. i'm wandering if nginx
> is nmapping files into memory, which would allow it to outperform in
> this way, or if i am missing a point here.
>
> i'd be glad to have pointers on how to improve fast file sending over http.
>
> cheers,
>
> r.
>
> =========================================
> -module(send_file).
> -include_lib("kernel/include/file.hrl").
> -compile(export_all).
>
> % sending of a file
> file_send(Socket, FilePath, Headers) ->
>        % get file size
>        case file:read_file_info(FilePath) of
>                {ok, FileInfo} ->
>                        % get filesize
>                        FileSize = FileInfo#file_info.size,
>                        % do the gradual sending
>                        file_open_and_send(Socket, FilePath);
>                {error, Reason} ->
>                        {error, Reason}
>        end.
> file_open_and_send(Socket, FilePath) ->
>        case file:open(FilePath, [read, binary]) of
>                {error, Reason} ->
>                        {error, Reason};
>                {ok, IoDevice} ->
>                        % read portions
>                        case file_read_and_send(Socket, IoDevice, 0) of
>                                {error, Reason} ->
>                                        file:close(IoDevice),
>                                        {error, Reason};
>                                ok ->
>                                        file:close(IoDevice),
>                                        ok
>                        end
>        end.
> file_read_and_send(Socket, IoDevice, Position) ->
>        % read buffer
>        case file:pread(IoDevice, Position, ?FILE_READ_BUFFER) of
>                {ok, Data} ->
>                        % file read, send
>                        gen_tcp:send(Socket, Data),
>                        % loop
>                        file_read_and_send(Socket, IoDevice, Position +
> ?FILE_READ_BUFFER);
>                eof ->
>                        % finished
>                        ok;
>                {error, Reason} ->
>                        {error, Reason}
>        end.
>
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