view tests/test-pull-branch.t @ 26623:5a95fe44121d

clonebundles: support for seeding clones from pre-generated bundles

Cloning can be an expensive operation for servers because the server
generates a bundle from existing repository data at request time. For
a large repository like mozilla-central, this consumes 4+ minutes
of CPU time on the server. It also results in significant network
utilization. Multiplied by hundreds or even thousands of clients and
the ensuing load can result in difficulties scaling the Mercurial server.

Despite generation of bundles being deterministic until the next
changeset is added, the generation of bundles to service a clone request
is not cached. Each clone thus performs redundant work. This is
wasteful.

This patch introduces the "clonebundles" extension and related
client-side functionality to help alleviate this deficiency. The
client-side feature is behind an experimental flag and is not enabled by
default.

It works as follows:

1) Server operator generates a bundle and makes it available on a
   server (likely HTTP).
2) Server operator defines the URL of a bundle file in a
   .hg/clonebundles.manifest file.
3) Client `hg clone`ing sees the server is advertising bundle URLs.
4) Client fetches and applies the advertised bundle.
5) Client performs equivalent of `hg pull` to fetch changes made since
   the bundle was created.

Essentially, the server performs the expensive work of generating a
bundle once and all subsequent clones fetch a static file from
somewhere. Scaling static file serving is a much more manageable
problem than scaling a Python application like Mercurial. Assuming your
repository grows less than 1% per day, the end result is 99+% of CPU
and network load from clones is eliminated, allowing Mercurial servers
to scale more easily. Serving static files also means data can be
transferred to clients as fast as they can consume it, rather than as
fast as servers can generate it. This makes clones faster.

Mozilla has implemented similar functionality of this patch on
hg.mozilla.org using a custom extension. We are hosting bundle files in
Amazon S3 and CloudFront (a CDN) and have successfully offloaded
>1 TB/day in data transfer from hg.mozilla.org, freeing up significant
bandwidth and CPU resources. The positive impact has been stellar and
I believe it has proved its value to be included in Mercurial core. I
feel it is important for the client-side support to be enabled in core
by default because it means that clients will get faster, more reliable
clones and will enable server operators to reduce load without
requiring any client-side configuration changes (assuming clients are
up to date, of course).

The scope of this feature is narrowly and specifically tailored to
cloning, despite "serve pulls from pre-generated bundles" being a valid
and useful feature. I would eventually like for Mercurial servers to
support transferring *all* repository data via statically hosted files.
You could imagine a server that siphons all pushed data to bundle files
and instructs clients to apply a stream of bundles to reconstruct all
repository data. This feature, while useful and powerful, is
significantly more work to implement because it requires the server
component have awareness of discovery and a mapping of which changesets
are in which files. Full, clone bundles, by contrast, are much simpler.

The wire protocol command is named "clonebundles" instead of something
more generic like "staticbundles" to leave the door open for a new, more
powerful and more generic server-side component with minimal backwards
compatibility implications. The name "bundleclone" is used by Mozilla's
extension and would cause problems since there are subtle differences
in Mozilla's extension.

Mozilla's experience with this idea has taught us that some form of
"content negotiation" is required. Not all clients will support all
bundle formats or even URLs (advanced TLS requirements, etc). To ensure
the highest uptake possible, a server needs to advertise multiple
versions of bundles and clients need to be able to choose the most
appropriate from that list one. The "attributes" in each
server-advertised entry facilitate this filtering and sorting. Their
use will become apparent in subsequent patches.

Initial inspiration and credit for the idea of cloning from static files
belongs to Augie Fackler and his "lookaside clone" extension proof of
concept.

  $ hg init t
  $ cd t
  $ echo 1 > foo
  $ hg ci -Am1 # 0
  adding foo
  $ hg branch branchA
  marked working directory as branch branchA
  (branches are permanent and global, did you want a bookmark?)
  $ echo a1 > foo
  $ hg ci -ma1 # 1

  $ cd ..
  $ hg init tt
  $ cd tt
  $ hg pull ../t
  pulling from ../t
  requesting all changes
  adding changesets
  adding manifests
  adding file changes
  added 2 changesets with 2 changes to 1 files
  (run 'hg update' to get a working copy)
  $ hg up branchA
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved

  $ cd ../t
  $ echo a2 > foo
  $ hg ci -ma2 # 2

Create branch B:

  $ hg up 0
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ hg branch branchB
  marked working directory as branch branchB
  $ echo b1 > foo
  $ hg ci -mb1 # 3

  $ cd ../tt

A new branch is there

  $ hg pull -u ../t
  pulling from ../t
  searching for changes
  adding changesets
  adding manifests
  adding file changes
  added 2 changesets with 2 changes to 1 files (+1 heads)
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved

Develop both branches:

  $ cd ../t
  $ hg up branchA
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo a3 > foo
  $ hg ci -ma3 # 4
  $ hg up branchB
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo b2 > foo
  $ hg ci -mb2 # 5

  $ cd ../tt

Should succeed, no new heads:

  $ hg pull -u ../t
  pulling from ../t
  searching for changes
  adding changesets
  adding manifests
  adding file changes
  added 2 changesets with 2 changes to 1 files
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved

Add a head on other branch:

  $ cd ../t
  $ hg up branchA
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo a4 > foo
  $ hg ci -ma4 # 6
  $ hg up branchB
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo b3.1 > foo
  $ hg ci -m b3.1 # 7
  $ hg up 5
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo b3.2 > foo
  $ hg ci -m b3.2 # 8
  created new head

  $ cd ../tt

Should succeed because there is only one head on our branch:

  $ hg pull -u ../t
  pulling from ../t
  searching for changes
  adding changesets
  adding manifests
  adding file changes
  added 3 changesets with 3 changes to 1 files (+1 heads)
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved

  $ cd ../t
  $ hg up -C branchA
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo a5.1 > foo
  $ hg ci -ma5.1 # 9
  $ hg up 6
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo a5.2 > foo
  $ hg ci -ma5.2 # 10
  created new head
  $ hg up 7
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo b4.1 > foo
  $ hg ci -m b4.1 # 11
  $ hg up -C 8
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo b4.2 > foo
  $ hg ci -m b4.2 # 12

  $ cd ../tt

  $ hg pull -u ../t
  pulling from ../t
  searching for changes
  adding changesets
  adding manifests
  adding file changes
  added 4 changesets with 4 changes to 1 files (+1 heads)
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved

Make changes on new branch on tt

  $ hg up 6
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ hg branch branchC
  marked working directory as branch branchC
  $ echo b1 > bar
  $ hg ci -Am "commit on branchC on tt"
  adding bar

Make changes on default branch on t

  $ cd ../t
  $ hg up -C default
  1 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo a1 > bar
  $ hg ci -Am "commit on default on t"
  adding bar

Pull branchC from tt

  $ hg pull ../tt
  pulling from ../tt
  searching for changes
  adding changesets
  adding manifests
  adding file changes
  added 1 changesets with 1 changes to 1 files (+1 heads)
  (run 'hg heads' to see heads)

Make changes on default and branchC on tt

  $ cd ../tt
  $ hg pull ../t
  pulling from ../t
  searching for changes
  adding changesets
  adding manifests
  adding file changes
  added 1 changesets with 1 changes to 1 files (+1 heads)
  (run 'hg heads' to see heads)
  $ hg up -C default
  2 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo a1 > bar1
  $ hg ci -Am "commit on default on tt"
  adding bar1
  $ hg up branchC
  2 files updated, 0 files merged, 1 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo a1 > bar2
  $ hg ci -Am "commit on branchC on tt"
  adding bar2

Make changes on default and branchC on t

  $ cd ../t
  $ hg up default
  0 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo a1 > bar3
  $ hg ci -Am "commit on default on t"
  adding bar3
  $ hg up branchC
  2 files updated, 0 files merged, 1 files removed, 0 files unresolved
  $ echo a1 > bar4
  $ hg ci -Am "commit on branchC on tt"
  adding bar4

Pull from tt

  $ hg pull ../tt
  pulling from ../tt
  searching for changes
  adding changesets
  adding manifests
  adding file changes
  added 2 changesets with 2 changes to 2 files (+2 heads)
  (run 'hg heads .' to see heads, 'hg merge' to merge)

  $ cd ..