Whisper
Overview
Whisper is one of three components within the Graphite project:
- Graphite-Web, a Django-based web application that renders graphs and dashboards
- The Carbon metric processing daemons
- The Whisper time-series database library
Whisper is a fixed-size database, similar in design and purpose to RRD (round-robin-database). It provides fast, reliable storage of numeric data over time. Whisper allows for higher resolution (seconds per point) of recent data to degrade into lower resolutions for long-term retention of historical data.
Installation, Configuration and Usage
Please refer to the instructions at readthedocs.
Whisper Scripts
rrd2whisper.py
Convert a rrd file into a whisper (.wsp) file.
Usage: rrd2whisper.py rrd_path
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--xFilesFactor=XFILESFACTOR
The xFilesFactor to use in the output file. Defaults
to the input RRD's xFilesFactor
--aggregationMethod=AGGREGATIONMETHOD
The consolidation function to fetch from on input and
aggregationMethod to set on output. One of: average,
last, max, min, avg_zero, absmax, absmin
--destinationPath=DESTINATIONPATH
Path to place created whisper file. Defaults to the
RRD file's source path.
whisper-create.py
Create a new whisper database file.
Usage: whisper-create.py path timePerPoint:timeToStore [timePerPoint:timeToStore]*
whisper-create.py --estimate timePerPoint:timeToStore [timePerPoint:timeToStore]*
timePerPoint and timeToStore specify lengths of time, for example:
60:1440 60 seconds per datapoint, 1440 datapoints = 1 day of retention
15m:8 15 minutes per datapoint, 8 datapoints = 2 hours of retention
1h:7d 1 hour per datapoint, 7 days of retention
12h:2y 12 hours per datapoint, 2 years of retention
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--xFilesFactor=XFILESFACTOR
--aggregationMethod=AGGREGATIONMETHOD
Function to use when aggregating values (average, sum,
last, max, min, avg_zero, absmax, absmin)
--overwrite
--estimate Don't create a whisper file, estimate storage requirements based on archive definitions
whisper-dump.py
Dump the metadata about a whisper file to stdout.
Usage: whisper-dump.py path
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--pretty Show human-readable timestamps instead of unix times
-t TIME_FORMAT, --time-format=TIME_FORMAT
Time format to use with --pretty; see time.strftime()
whisper-fetch.py
Fetch all the metrics stored in a whisper file to stdout.
Usage: whisper-fetch.py [options] path
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--from=_FROM Unix epoch time of the beginning of your requested interval
(default: 24 hours ago)
--until=UNTIL Unix epoch time of the end of your requested interval
(default: now)
--json Output results in JSON form
--pretty Show human-readable timestamps instead of unix times
-t TIME_FORMAT, --time-format=TIME_FORMAT
Time format to use with --pretty; see time.strftime()
--drop=DROP Specify 'nulls' to drop all null values. Specify 'zeroes' to
drop all zero values. Specify 'empty' to drop both null and
zero values.
whisper-info.py
Usage: whisper-info.py path [field]
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
whisper-merge.py
Join two existing whisper files together.
Usage: whisper-merge.py [options] from_path to_path
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
whisper-fill.py
Copies data from src in dst, if missing.
Unlike whisper-merge, don't overwrite data that's
already present in the target file, but instead, only add the missing
data (e.g. where the gaps in the target file are). Because no values
are overwritten, no data or precision gets lost. Also, unlike
whisper-merge, try to take the highest-precision archive to provide
the data, instead of the one with the largest retention.
Usage: whisper-fill.py [options] src_path dst_path
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
whisper-resize.py
Change the retention rates of an existing whisper file.
Usage: whisper-resize.py path timePerPoint:timeToStore [timePerPoint:timeToStore]*
timePerPoint and timeToStore specify lengths of time, for example:
60:1440 60 seconds per datapoint, 1440 datapoints = 1 day of retention
15m:8 15 minutes per datapoint, 8 datapoints = 2 hours of retention
1h:7d 1 hour per datapoint, 7 days of retention
12h:2y 12 hours per datapoint, 2 years of retention
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--xFilesFactor=XFILESFACTOR
Change the xFilesFactor
--aggregationMethod=AGGREGATIONMETHOD
Change the aggregation function (average, sum, last,
max, min, avg_zero, absmax, absmin)
--force Perform a destructive change
--newfile=NEWFILE Create a new database file without removing the
existing one
--nobackup Delete the .bak file after successful execution
--aggregate Try to aggregate the values to fit the new archive
better. Note that this will make things slower and use
more memory.
whisper-set-aggregation-method.py
Change the aggregation method of an existing whisper file.
Usage: whisper-set-aggregation-method.py path <average, sum, last, max, min, avg_zero, absmax, absmin>
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
whisper-update.py
Update a whisper file with 1 or many values, must provide a time stamp with the value.
Usage: whisper-update.py [options] path timestamp:value [timestamp:value]*
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
whisper-diff.py
Check the differences between whisper files. Use sanity check before merging.
Usage: whisper-diff.py [options] path_a path_b
Options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
--summary show summary of differences
--ignore-empty skip comparison if either value is undefined
--columns print output in simple columns
--no-headers do not print column headers
--until=UNTIL Unix epoch time of the end of your requested interval
(default: now)
--json Output results in JSON form
License
Whisper is licensed under version 2.0 of the Apache License. See the LICENSE file for details.