ab man page on OSF1

Man page or keyword search:  
man Server   12896 pages
apropos Keyword Search (all sections)
Output format
OSF1 logo
[printable version]

AB(8)				      ab				 AB(8)

NAME
       ab - Apache HTTP server benchmarking tool

SYNOPSIS
       ab [ -A auth-username:password ] [ -b windowsize ] [ -c concurrency ] [
       -C cookie-name=value ] [ -d ] [ -e csv-file ] [ -f protocol ] [ -g gnu‐
       plot-file ] [ -h ] [ -H custom-header ] [ -i ] [ -k ] [ -n requests ] [
       -p POST-file ] [ -P proxy-auth-username:password ] [ -q ] [ -r ] [ -s ]
       [ -S ] [ -t timelimit ] [ -T content-type ] [ -v verbosity] [ -V ] [ -w
       ] [ -x <table>-attributes ] [ -X proxy[:port] ] [ -y <tr>-attributes  ]
       [   -z	<td>-attributes	  ]   [	 -Z  ciphersuite  ]  [http[s]://]host‐
       name[:port]/path

SUMMARY
       ab is a tool for benchmarking your Apache Hypertext  Transfer  Protocol
       (HTTP)  server.	It  is	designed to give you an impression of how your
       current Apache installation performs. This  especially  shows  you  how
       many  requests  per second your Apache installation is capable of serv‐
       ing.

OPTIONS
       -A auth-username:password
	      Supply BASIC Authentication credentials to the server. The user‐
	      name  and	 password  are separated by a single : and sent on the
	      wire base64 encoded. The string is sent  regardless  of  whether
	      the  server  needs  it  (i.e.,  has  sent	 an 401 authentication
	      needed).

       -b windowsize
	      Size of TCP send/receive buffer, in bytes.

       -c concurrency
	      Number of multiple requests to perform at a time. Default is one
	      request at a time.

       -C cookie-name=value
	      Add  a Cookie: line to the request. The argument is typically in
	      the form of a name=value pair. This field is repeatable.

       -d     Do not display the "percentage served  within  XX	 [ms]  table".
	      (legacy support).

       -e csv-file
	      Write a Comma separated value (CSV) file which contains for each
	      percentage (from 1% to 100%) the time (in milliseconds) it  took
	      to  serve	 that percentage of the requests. This is usually more
	      useful than the 'gnuplot'	 file;	as  the	 results  are  already
	      'binned'.

       -f protocol
	      Specify SSL/TLS protocol (SSL2, SSL3, TLS1, or ALL).

       -g gnuplot-file
	      Write  all  measured values out as a 'gnuplot' or TSV (Tab sepa‐
	      rate values) file. This file can easily be imported  into	 pack‐
	      ages  like  Gnuplot,  IDL,  Mathematica, Igor or even Excel. The
	      labels are on the first line of the file.

       -h     Display usage information.

       -H custom-header
	      Append extra headers to the request. The argument	 is  typically
	      in the form of a valid header line, containing a colon-separated
	      field-value pair (i.e., "Accept-Encoding: zip/zop;8bit").

       -i     Do HEAD requests instead of GET.

       -k     Enable  the  HTTP	 KeepAlive  feature,  i.e.,  perform  multiple
	      requests within one HTTP session. Default is no KeepAlive.

       -n requests
	      Number  of requests to perform for the benchmarking session. The
	      default is to just perform a single request which usually	 leads
	      to non-representative benchmarking results.

       -p POST-file
	      File containing data to POST. Remember to also set -T.

       -P proxy-auth-username:password
	      Supply BASIC Authentication credentials to a proxy en-route. The
	      username and password are separated by a single :	 and  sent  on
	      the  wire	 base64	 encoded.  The	string	is  sent regardless of
	      whether the proxy needs it (i.e., has sent an 407 proxy  authen‐
	      tication needed).

       -q     When  processing	more  than 150 requests, ab outputs a progress
	      count on stderr every 10% or 100 requests or  so.	 The  -q  flag
	      will suppress these messages.

       -r     Don't exit on socket receive errors.

       -s     When  compiled  in  (ab  -h will show you) use the SSL protected
	      https rather than the http protocol. This feature is  experimen‐
	      tal and very rudimentary. You probably do not want to use it.

       -S     Do  not  display	the  median and standard deviation values, nor
	      display the warning/error messages when the average  and	median
	      are more than one or two times the standard deviation apart. And
	      default to the min/avg/max values. (legacy support).

       -t timelimit
	      Maximum number  of  seconds  to  spend  for  benchmarking.  This
	      implies  a -n 50000 internally. Use this to benchmark the server
	      within a fixed total amount of time. Per	default	 there	is  no
	      timelimit.

       -T content-type
	      Content-type header to use for POST data, eg. application/x-www-
	      form-urlencoded. Default: text/plain.

       -v verbosity
	      Set verbosity level - 4 and above prints information on headers,
	      3	 and above prints response codes (404, 200, etc.), 2 and above
	      prints warnings and info.

       -V     Display version number and exit.

       -w     Print out results in HTML tables. Default table is  two  columns
	      wide, with a white background.

       -x <table>-attributes
	      String to use as attributes for <table>. Attributes are inserted
	      <table here >.

       -X proxy[:port]
	      Use a proxy server for the requests.

       -y <tr>-attributes
	      String to use as attributes for <tr>.

       -z <td>-attributes
	      String to use as attributes for <td>.

       -Z ciphersuite
	      Specify SSL/TLS cipher suite (See openssl ciphers).

BUGS
       There are various statically declared buffers of fixed length. Combined
       with the lazy parsing of the command line arguments, the response head‐
       ers from the server and other external inputs, this might bite you.

       It does not implement HTTP/1.x  fully;  only  accepts  some  'expected'
       forms  of  responses. The rather heavy use of strstr(3) shows up top in
       profile, which might indicate a performance problem;  i.e.,  you	 would
       measure the ab performance rather than the server's.

Apache HTTP Server		  2008-10-23				 AB(8)
[top]
                             _         _         _ 
                            | |       | |       | |     
                            | |       | |       | |     
                         __ | | __ __ | | __ __ | | __  
                         \ \| |/ / \ \| |/ / \ \| |/ /  
                          \ \ / /   \ \ / /   \ \ / /   
                           \   /     \   /     \   /    
                            \_/       \_/       \_/ 
More information is available in HTML format for server OSF1

List of man pages available for OSF1

Copyright (c) for man pages and the logo by the respective OS vendor.

For those who want to learn more, the polarhome community provides shell access and support.

[legal] [privacy] [GNU] [policy] [cookies] [netiquette] [sponsors] [FAQ]
Tweet
Polarhome, production since 1999.
Member of Polarhome portal.
Based on Fawad Halim's script.
....................................................................
Vote for polarhome
Free Shell Accounts :: the biggest list on the net