Monitoring Resources

In Parallels Server Bare Metal, you can use the pstat utility to monitor system resources in real time. When executed, the utility displays the status and load of the system: its disk, network, CPU, memory, and other parameters. It also provides the list of running virtual machines and Containers together with their resources consumption statistics. For example, you can run the following command on the server to view your current system resources:

# pstat -d 5

5:39pm, up 4 days, 5:33, 2 users, load average: 1.08, 1.11, 1.05

CTNum 2, procs 268: R 1, S 265, D 1, Z 0, T 1, X 0

CPU [ OK ]: CTs 0%, CT0 0%, user 0%, sys 1%, idle 99%, lat(ms) 1/0

Mem [ OK ]: total 7831MB, free 4147MB/0MB (low/high), lat(ms) 1/0

ZONE0 (DMA): size 9MB, act 0MB, inact 0MB, free 10MB (0/0/0)

ZONE1 (DMA32): size 3238MB, act 42MB, inact 39MB, free 3118MB (4/5/6)

ZONE2 (Normal): size 4661MB, act 2730MB, inact 606MB, free 1019MB (6/8/9)

Mem lat (ms): A0 0, K0 1, U0 0, K1 1, U1 0

Slab pages: 181MB/181MB (ino 39MB, de 13MB, bh 21MB, pb 40MB)

Swap [ OK ]: tot 2000MB, free 2000MB, in 0.000MB/s, out 0.000MB/s

Net [ OK ]: tot: in 0.027MB/s 233pkt/s, out 0.040MB/s 37pkt/s

lo: in 0.000MB/s 0pkt/s, out 0.000MB/s 0pkt/s

eth0: in 0.014MB/s 116pkt/s, out 0.020MB/s 19pkt/s

sit0: in 0.000MB/s 0pkt/s, out 0.000MB/s 0pkt/s

br0: in 0.000MB/s 0pkt/s, out 0.000MB/s 0pkt/s

br1: in 0.013MB/s 116pkt/s, out 0.020MB/s 19pkt/s

Disks [ OK ]: in 0.000MB/s, out 0.000MB/s

ST %VM %KM CPU FCNT MLAT NAME

OK 0.0/27 0.0/- 0.00/33 0 0 1

OK 0.2/685 0.0/- 0.00/33 0 0 101

OK 0.4/685 0.0/- 0.00/33 0 0 102

OK 27/6.7 0.1/- 0.00/33 0 0 Windows7

The command output is updated with the time interval equal to the value specified after the –d (delay) option measured in seconds. In the session above, the statistics displayed is renewed every five seconds. If the –d option is not specified, the default interval equals 1 second.

As you can see, the utility provides real-time information on all main resources subsystems pertaining both to the physical server and to its virtual machines and Containers: the disk, network, CPU, and memory subsystems. You may want to shrink the output of the utility by specifying the –b (brief) option instead of the –v (verbose) one, or to do without any options to use the “normal” mode of displaying.

The following information is displayed by default per each virtual machine or Container:

Column Name	Description
`ST`	virtual machine or Container status. If there are no failed counters and the latency values are normal, the status is “OK”. Otherwise, it is displayed in red as “!!”. You can sort virtual machines and Containers by their status to see the problem virtual machines and Containers first.
`%VM`	Virtual memory usage, in per cent to the total memory. The first number is how much virtual memory is being used, and the second one is the virtual memory barrier.
`%KM`	Kernel memory usage, in per cent to the normal zone size. The first number is how much kernel memory is being used, and the second one is the kernel memory barrier.
`CPU`	CPU usage in per cent to all available CPUs. The first number is how much of the CPU power is being used by the virtual machine or Container, and the second one is its guaranteed share judging by the `cpuunits` parameter. Note that the actual CPU usage may be higher than the guaranteed one.
`FCNT`	The number of failed counters for all the resource parameters. In the standard mode of displaying, this number represents the increase of failed counters since the previous screen update, whereas in the average mode of displaying, it represents an absolute failed counters sum for the given virtual machine or Container.
`MLAT`	Maximal scheduling latency for the virtual machine or Container, in ms. This parameter shows the maximal scheduling latency inside the given virtual machine or Container, i.e. for how long (at the utmost) a process inside the virtual machine or Container awaits for the CPU.
`NAME`	virtual machine or Container name.

The %VM , %KM , and CPU columns provide two values per column separated by a slash for each virtual machine and Container. The first value indicates the real usage of the corresponding parameter by the virtual machine and Container, and the second one – the maximal value allowed for the virtual machine and Container.

For detailed information on options that you can use with the pstat utility, refer to the Parallels Server Bare Metal Command Linux Guide .

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