3. Release Notes¶

3.1. RTI Perftest 2.2 Compatibility¶

3.1.1. Using security¶

Governance and Permission files have been updated to be compatible with the latest release for RTI Connext DDS, and are compatible with RTI Connext DDS 5.2.7 and greater.

If you are compiling RTI Perftest against 5.2.5, you will need to get the certificates from the release/2.0 branch. You can do that by using the following git command from the top-level directory of your repository:

git checkout release/2.0 -- resource/secure

3.1.2. Compilation restrictions¶

RTI Perftest is designed to compile and work against the RTI Connext DDS 5.2.x and 5.3.x releases.

However, certain features are not compatible with all the RTI Connext DDS versions, since the build scripts make use of certain specific parameters in Rtiddsgen that might change or not be present between releases:

The --secure and --openssl-home parameters will not work for versions previous to RTI Connext DDS 5.2.5.
Java code generation against RTI Connext DDS 5.2.0.x will fail out of the box. You can disable this by adding the --skip-java-build flag. See the Known issues section for more information and alternatives.
C# code generation against RTI Connext DDS 5.2.0.x is not supported. You can disable this by adding the --skip-cs-build flag.

3.2. What’s New in 2.2¶

3.2.1. Added command-line parameters “-asynchronous” and “-flowController `<`flow`>`”¶

In previous releases Asynchronous Publishing was only enabled for the DataWriters when the samples were greater than 63000 bytes and in such case, RTI Perftest would only use a custom flow controller defined for 1Gbps networks.

This behavior has been modified: Starting with this release, Asynchronous Publishing will be activated if the samples to send are bigger than 63000 bytes or if the -asynchronous command-line parameter is used. In that case, RTI Perftest will use the Default flow controller. However, now you can change this behavior by specifying the -flowController option, which allows you to specify if you want to use the default flow controller, a 1Gbps flow controller, or a 10Gbps one.

3.2.2. Improved “-pubRate” command-line parameter capabilities¶

In previous releases the “-pubRate” command-line option would only use the spin function to control the publication rate, which could have negative effects related with high CPU consumption for certain scenarios. Starting with this release, a new modifier has been added to this option so it is possible to use the both “spin” and “sleep” as a way to control the publication rate.

3.2.3. Added command-line parameter to get the CPU consumption of the process¶

Starting with this release, it is possible to display the CPU consumption of the RTI Perftest process by adding the Command-Line Parameter -cpu.

3.2.4. Better support for large data samples¶

Prior to this release, the maximum sample size allowed by RTI Perftest was set to 131072 bytes. The use of bigger sizes would imply changes in the perftest.idl file and source code files. Starting with this release, the maximum data length that RTI Perftest allows has increased to 2,147,483,135 bytes, which corresponds to 2 Gbytes - 512 bytes - 8 bytes, the maximum data length that RTI Connext DDS can send.

The sample size can be set via the -dataLen <bytes> command-line parameter. If this value is larger than 63,000 bytes RTI Perftest will enable the use of Asynchronous Publishing and Unbounded Sequences.

It is also possible to enable the use of Unbounded Sequences or Asynchronous Publishing independently of the sample size by specifying the command-line parameters unbounded <managerMemory> and -asynchronous.

3.2.5. Added command-line parameter “-peer” to specify the discovery peers¶

In previous releases the only way to provide the Initial Peers was either adding them to the QoS XML file or by using the environment variable NDDS_DISCOVERY_PEERS. Now it is possible to use a new command-line parameter: -peer <address> with the peer address.

3.2.6. Now providing RTI Routing Service configuration files to test performance along with RTI Perftest¶

A new configuration file and wrapper script have been added for testing RTI Perftest using one or several RTI Routing Service applications in between Publisher and Subscriber. A new section has been added to the documentation with all the configuration parameters: Using RTI Perftest with RTI Routing-Service.

3.2.7. Changed Announcement QoS profile to use “Transient local” Durability settings¶

In previous releases, the announcement topic DataWriters and DataReaders were set to have a Volatile Durability QoS. In certain complex scenarios, that could result in incorrect communication, which could cause the RTI Perftest Publisher and Subscribers to get stuck and not transmit data. By changing this topic to use Transient Local Durability, these scenarios are avoided.

This should not have any effect on the latency of throughput reported by RTI Perftest (as the main Throughput and Latency topics still have the same configuration).

3.2.8. Added new functionality: Content Filtered Topic.¶

In previous releases the only way to provide scalability was by using multicast and unicast. Now you can also choose which subscriber will receive the samples by using the parameter -cft. You can also determine which sample will be sent by the publisher with the parameter -writeInstance.

3.3. What’s Fixed in 2.2¶

3.3.1. Conflicts when using “-multicast” and “-enableSharedMemory” at the same time¶

In previous releases, using “-multicast” in conjunction with “-enableSharedMemory” may have caused the middleware to fail while trying to access multicast resources although it was set to use only shared memory. This behavior has been fixed.

3.3.2. “-nic” command-line parameter not working when using TCP transport¶

In previous releases the -nic command-line parameter was not taken into account when using the TCP transport. This behavior has been fixed.

3.3.3. Batching disabled when sample size was greater than or equal to batch size¶

In previous releases the Batching Parameters were set unconditionally, now the Batching QoS will be only applied if the Batch size is strictly greater than the sample size.

3.3.4. Changed name of the “-enableTcp” option¶

In previous releases, the command-line option to use TCP for communication was named -enableTcpOnly. This is was inconsistent with other transport options, so the name of the command has been changed to -enableTcp.

3.3.5. Dynamic Data not working properly when using large samples¶

In previous releases the following error could happen when using the -dynamicData command-line parameter in conjunction with -dataLen greater than 63000 bytes:

DDS_DynamicDataStream_assert_array_or_seq_member:!sparsely stored member exceeds 65535 bytes
DDS_DynamicData_set_octet_array:field bin_data (id=0) not found
Failed to set uint8_t array

This error has been fixed starting in this release by resetting the members of the Dynamic Data object before repopulating it.

3.4. What’s New in 2.1¶

3.4.1. Multicast Periodic Heartbeats when the `-multicast` command-line parameter is present¶

In previous releases, the Writer side sent heartbeats via unicast even if the command-line parameter -multicast was present. Now heartbeats will be sent via multicast when -multicast is used. This change should not affect one-to-one scenarios, but it will reduce the number of heartbeats the Publisher side has to send in scenarios with multiple subscribers.

3.4.2. Added command-line parameter to get the Pulled Sample Count in the Publisher side¶

The -writerStats command-line parameter now enables the some extra debug log messages shown in the Publisher side of RTI Perftest. These messages will contain the total number of samples being “pulled” by the Subscriber side.

3.4.3. Added extra logic to be able to support RTI Connext DDS 5.2.7 on Windows Systems¶

The names of the solutions generated by rtiddsgen for Windows architectures changed in Code Generator 3.2.6 (included with RTI Connext DDS 5.2.7). The solution name now includes the rtiddsgen version number. Therefore the RTIPerftest’s build.bat script now must query the rtiddsgen version and adjust the name of the generated solutions it needs to call to compile.

This change should not be noticed by the user, as the script will automatically handle the task of determining the version of rtiddsgen.

3.4.4. Added command-line parameter to avoid loading QoS from xml in C++.¶

If the -noXmlQos option is provided to RTI Perftest it will not try to load the QoS from the xml file, instead it will load the QoS from a string provided in the code. This string contains the same values the xml file provides.

This option is only present for the Modern and Traditional C++ PSM API code.

Note that changes in the xml will be ignored if this option is present.

3.4.5. Updated Secure Certificates, Governance and Permission Files¶

Governance and Permission files have been updated to be compatible with the latest release for RTI Connext DDS, and are compatible with RTI Connext DDS 5.2.7 and greater.

If you are compiling RTI Perftest against 5.2.5, you will need to get the certificates from the release/2.0 branch. You can do that by using the following git command from the top-level directory of your repository:

git checkout release/2.0 -- resource/secure

3.5. What’s Fixed in 2.1¶

3.5.1. “–nddshome” Command-Line Option did not Work in `build.bat` Script – Windows Systems Only¶

There was an error in the build.sh script logic when checking for the existence of the compiler executable files. This problem has been resolved.

3.5.2. `build.sh` script did not make sure executable existed before starting compilation¶

Part of the build.sh script logic to check the existence of the compiler executable files was not being called properly. This issue is now fixed.

3.5.3. Incorrect `high_watermark` value when `sendQueueSize` is set to 1¶

Setting the command-line parameter -sendQueueSize to 1 caused RTI Perftest to fail, since it mistakenly set the high_watermark value equal to the low_watermark. This problem has been resolved. Now the high_watermark is always greater than the low_watermark.

3.5.4. Batching settings not correctly set in the `C++03` code¶

Settings related to batching in the XML configuration (perftest_qos_profiles.xml) were not being used. This problem has been resolved.

3.5.5. `dds.transport.shmem.builtin.received_message_count_max` incorrectly set in Java code¶

The dds.transport.shmem.builtin.received_message_count_max property was incorrectly set to 1 in every case. This erroneous behavior, which was introduced in RTI Perftest 2.0, has been resolved.

3.5.6. Command-line parameter for setting the RTI Connext DDS verbosity¶

In previous releases of RTI Perftest, the RTI Connext DDS verbosity could only be modified by using the command-line parameter -debug. This parameter would set the verbosity to STATUS_ALL, with no option to select an intermediate verbosity.

This behavior has been modified. The command-line parameter -debug has been changed to -verbosity, which can be followed by one of the verbosity levels (Silent, Error, Warning, or All).

The default verbosity is Error.

3.6. What’s New in 2.0¶

3.6.1. Platform support and build system¶

RTI Perftest 2.0 makes use of the RTI Connext DDS Rtiddsgen tool in order to generate part of its code and also the makefile/project files used to compile that code.

Therefore, all the already generated makefiles and Visual Studio solutions have been removed and now the build system depends on 2 scripts: build.sh for Unix-based systems and build.bat for Windows systems.

RTI Perftest scripts works for every platform for which Rtiddsgen can generate an example, except for those in which Rtiddsgen doesn’t generate regular makefiles or Visual Studio Solutions but specific project files. That is the case of Android platforms as well as the iOS ones.

Certain platforms will compile with the out of-the-box code and configurations, but further tuning could be needed in order to make the application run in the specific platform. The reason is usually the memory consumption of the application or the lack of support of the platform for certain features (like a file system).

3.6.2. Improved directory structure¶

RTI Perftest 2.0 directory structure has been cleaned up, having now a much more compact and consistent schema.

3.6.3. Github¶

RTI Perftest development has been moved to a GitHub project. This will allow more frequently updates and code contributions.

The URL of the project is the following: github.com/rticommunity/rtiperftest.

3.6.4. Numeration schema¶

RTI Perftest development and releases are now decoupled from RTI Connext DDS ones, therefore, and to avoid future numeration conflicts, RTI Perftest moved to a different numeration schema.

The compatibility between RTI Perftest versions and RTI Connext DDS ones will be clearly stated in the release notes of every RTI Perftest release, as well as in the top-level README.md file.

3.6.5. Documentation¶

Documentation is no longer provided as a PDF document, but as markdown files as well as in html format. You will be able to access to the documentation from the RTI Community page, as well as from the GitHub project.

3.6.6. Support for UDPv6¶

Added command-line parameter to force communication via UDPv6. By specifying -enableUdpv6 you will only communicate data by using the UDPv6 transport.

The use of this feature will imply setting the NDDS_DISCOVERY_PEERS environment variable to (at least) one valid IPv6 address.

3.6.7. Support for Dynamic data¶

Added command-line parameter to specify the use of the Dynamic Data API instead of the regular Rtiddsgen generated code use.

3.6.8. Simplified execution in VxWorks kernel mode¶

The execution in VxWorks OS kernel mode has been simplified for the user. Now the user can make use of subscriber_main() and publisher_main() and modify its content with all the parameters required for the tests.

3.6.9. Decreased Memory Requirements for Latency Performance Test¶

The default number of iterations (samples sent by the performance test publisher side) when performing a latency test has been updated. Before, the default value was 100,000,000. This value was used to internally allocate certain buffers, which imposed large memory requirements. The new value is 10,000,000 (10 times less).

3.7. What’s Fixed in 2.0¶

3.7.1. RTI Perftest behavior when using multiple publishers¶

The previous behavior specified that an RTI Perftest Subscriber in a scenario with multiple RTI Perftest Publishers would stop receiving samples and exit after receiving the last sample from the RTI Perftest Publisher with pid=0. This behavior could lead into an hang state if some RTI Perftest Publishers with different pid were still missing to send new samples.

The new behavior makes the RTI Perftest Subscriber wait until all the Perftest Publishers finish sending all their samples and then exit.

3.7.2. Possible `std::bad_alloc` and Segmentation Fault in Latency Test in case of insufficient memory¶

When performing a latency performance test with traditional or modern C++, the test tries to allocate certain arrays of unsigned longs. These arrays can be quite large. On certain embedded platforms, due to memory limitations, this caused a std::bad_alloc error that was not properly captured, and a segmentation fault. This problem has been resolved. Now the performance test will inform you of the memory allocation issue and exit properly.

3.7.3. Default Max Number of Instances on Subscriber Side Changed to `DDS_LENGTH_UNLIMITED`¶

In the previous release, if you did not set the maximum number of instances on the subscriber side, it would default to one instance. Therefore the samples for all instances except the first one were lost.

The new default maximum number of instances on the subscriber side has been changed from one to DDS_LENGTH_UNLIMITED. You can change this limit manually by setting the Parameter -instances <number>.

3.7.4. Error when using Shared Memory and Large Samples¶

When using RTI Perftest with large samples and enabling shared memory we could get into the following error:

Large data settings enabled (-dataLen > 63000).
[D0001|ENABLE]NDDS_Transport_Shmem_Property_verify:received_message_count_max < 1
[D0001|ENABLE]NDDS_Transport_Shmem_newI:Invalid transport properties.

3.8. Known Issues¶

3.8.1. Building RTI Perftest Java API against RTI Connext DDS 5.2.0.x¶

Due to the changes added in order to support larger data sizes, RTI Perftest now makes use of Unbounded Sequences. This feature was not added to RTI Connext DDS in 5.2.0.x, so the following error will be reported when trying to compile the Java API:

[INFO]: Generating types and makefiles for java.
[INFO]: Command: "/home/test/nevada/bin/rtiddsgen" -language java -unboundedSupport -replace -package com.rti.perftest.gen -d "/home/test/test-antonio/srcJava" "/home/test/test-antonio/srcIdl/perftest.idl"
ERROR com.rti.ndds.nddsgen.Main Fail:  -unboundedSupport is only supported with C, C++, C++/CLI, or C# code generation
rtiddsgen version 2.3.0
Usage: rtiddsgen [-help]
. . .
INFO com.rti.ndds.nddsgen.Main Done (failures)
[ERROR]: Failure generating code for java.

In order to avoid this compilation error, 2 changes are needed:

In the build.sh or build.bat scripts, modify the call for Rtiddsgen and remove the -unboundedSupport flag.
In the srcIdl/perftest.idl file, modify the TestDataLarge_t and TestDataLargeKeyed_t types and add a bound to the bin_data member: sequence<octet,LIMIT> bin_data;.

3.8.2. Publication rate precision on Windows Systems when using “sleep” instead of “spin”¶

When using the -pubRate <#>:sleep or -sleep command-line parameters on Windows Systems the sleep() precision will be accurate up to 10 milliseconds. This means that for publication rates of more than 10000 samples per second we recommend using the “<#>:spin” option instead.

3.8.3. Compiling manually on Windows Systems when using the RTI Security plugin¶

rtiddsgen generated solutions for Windows Systems allow 4 different configurations:

Debug
Debug DLL
Release
Release DLL

However, the new RTI Perftest build system is focused on only compiling one of those modes at a time. To choose the compilation mode, use the -debug and -dynamic flags.