Technology Preview - Install Power Metrics Application

The Power Metrics app deploys two containers, cAdvisor and Telegraf that collect metrics about hardware usage. This document describes the technical preview of the Power Metrics functionality.

Prerequisites

For running power-metrics, your system must have the following drivers:

cpufreq kernel module

exposes per-CPU Frequency over sysfs (/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu%d/cpufreq/scaling_cur_freq)

msr kernel module

provides access to processor model specific registers over devfs (/dev/cpu/cpu%d/msr)

intel-rapl module

exposes Intel Runtime Power Limiting metrics over sysfs (/sys/devices/virtual/powercap/intel-rapl)

intel-uncore-frequency module

exposes Intel uncore frequency metrics over sysfs (/sys/devices/system/cpu/intel_uncore_frequency)

Uncore events can only be loaded from the following cpu models:

Model number	Processor name
0x55	Intel Skylake-X
0x6A	Intel IceLake-X
0x6C	Intel IceLake-D
0x47	Intel Broadwell-G
0x4F	Intel Broadwell-X
0x56	Intel Broadwell-D
0x8F	Intel Sapphire Rapids X
0xCF	Intel Emerald Rapids X

Source: https://github.com/influxdata/telegraf/issues/13098#issuecomment-1512585422

Procedure

1. Upload the application.

   [sysadmin@controller-0 (keystone_admin)]$ system application-upload /usr/local/share/applications/helm/power-metrics-[version].tgz
   

2. Apply the application.

   [sysadmin@controller-0 (keystone_admin)]$ system application-apply power-metrics
   

3. Wait until Power Metrics is in applied state.

   [sysadmin@controller-0 (keystone_admin)]$ system application-show power-metrics
   

4. Assign a label to the node:

   Note

   A label must be assigned for the power-metrics to be enabled in a node.

   power-metrics:enabled
   

   [sysadmin@controller-0 (keystone_admin)]$ system host-label-assign <node-name> power-metrics=enabled
   

Results

The Power Metrics should be installed and both cAdvisor and Telegraf pods must be up and running.

sysadmin@controller-0:~$ kubectl get pods -n power-metrics

NAME                              READY   STATUS    RESTARTS   AGE
cadvisor-v76zx                    1/1     Running   0          26h
telegraf-mc6vd                    1/1     Running   0          4d7h

It is possible to change some configurations via override.

Telegraf

Enable and disable Intel PMU metrics

You can activate the Intel PMU plugin with the following command:

  [sysadmin@controller-0 ~(keystone_admin)]$ system helm-override-update power-metrics telegraf power-metrics --set pmu_enabled=true
+----------------+-------------------+
| Property       | Value             |
+----------------+-------------------+
| name           | telegraf          |
| namespace      | power-metrics     |
| user_overrides | pmu_enabled: true |
|                |                   |
+----------------+-------------------+

Override intel_powerstat plugin

You can change the default intel_powerstat plugin parameters by override.

The plugin parameters include CPU and package metrics, and also the read method of MSR.

The list of available options for both CPU and package metrics can be found on the powerstat documentation: https://github.com/influxdata/telegraf/blob/master/plugins/inputs/intel_powerstat/README.md#configuration

It is worth noting that when overriding, the user must inform both metrics parameters (cpu and package), otherwise the plugin would stop collecting the missing metrics.

The read_method parameter specifies the reading method of MSR. This parameter accepts two values, concurrent or sequential. The default is concurrent. Concurrent method uses goroutines to read each MSR value concurrently.

The sequential method reads each value sequentially. This reduces latency overhead when using preempt-rt kernel with isolated cores, but might cause loss of precision on metrics calculation.

Example of overriding the powerstat plugin:

[sysadmin@controller-0 ~(keystone_admin)]$ cat telegraf-powerstat.yaml
config:
  intel_powerstat:
    read_method: "sequential"
    cpu_metrics: ["cpu_frequency","cpu_busy_frequency","cpu_temperature","cpu_c0_state_residency","cpu_c1_state_residency","cpu_c6_state_residency","cpu_busy_cycles"]
    package_metrics: ["current_power_consumption","current_dram_power_consumption","thermal_design_power","cpu_base_frequency"]

[sysadmin@controller-0 ~(keystone_admin)]$ system helm-override-update power-metrics telegraf power-metrics --values telegraf-powerstat.yaml
+----------------+--------------------------------------+
| Property       | Value                                |
+----------------+--------------------------------------+
| name           | telegraf                             |
| namespace      | power-metrics                        |
| user_overrides | config:                              |
|                |   intel_powerstat:                   |
|                |     cpu_metrics:                     |
|                |     - cpu_frequency                  |
|                |     - cpu_busy_frequency             |
|                |     - cpu_temperature                |
|                |     - cpu_c0_state_residency         |
|                |     - cpu_c1_state_residency         |
|                |     - cpu_c6_state_residency         |
|                |     - cpu_busy_cycles                |
|                |     package_metrics:                 |
|                |     - current_power_consumption      |
|                |     - current_dram_power_consumption |
|                |     - thermal_design_power           |
|                |     - cpu_base_frequency             |
|                |     read_method: sequential          |
|                |                                      |
+----------------+--------------------------------------+

Then, you can re-apply the app:

[sysadmin@controller-0 ~(keystone_admin)]$ system application-apply power-metrics

Add input plugins

You can add new plugins overriding the plugins column.

1. Add the cgroups plugin:

   [sysadmin@controller-0 ~(keystone_admin)]$ cat telegraf-cgroups.yaml
   config:
     inputs:
       - cgroup:
           paths: ["/sys/fs/cgroup/cpu","/sys/fs/cgroup/cpu/*","/sys/fs/cgroup/cpu/*/*",]
           files: ["cpuacct.usage", "cpuacct.usage_percpu", "cpu.cfs_period_us", "cpu.cfs_quota_us", "cpu.shares", "cpu.stat"]
   

2. Then apply the override:

   system helm-override-update power-metrics telegraf power-metrics --values /path/to/file.yaml
   [sysadmin@controller-0 ~(keystone_admin)]$ system helm-override-update power-metrics telegraf power-metrics --values telegraf-cgroups.yaml
   +----------------+--------------------------------+
   | Property       | Value                          |
   +----------------+--------------------------------+
   | name           | telegraf                       |
   | namespace      | power-metrics                  |
   | user_overrides | config:                        |
   |                |   inputs:                      |
   |                |   - cgroup:                    |
   |                |       files:                   |
   |                |       - cpuacct.usage          |
   |                |       - cpuacct.usage_percpu   |
   |                |       - cpu.cfs_period_us      |
   |                |       - cpu.cfs_quota_us       |
   |                |       - cpu.shares             |
   |                |       - cpu.stat               |
   |                |       paths:                   |
   |                |       - /sys/fs/cgroup/cpu     |
   |                |       - /sys/fs/cgroup/cpu/*   |
   |                |       - /sys/fs/cgroup/cpu/*/* |
   |                |                                |
   +----------------+--------------------------------+
   

3. After you can re-apply the app:

   [sysadmin@controller-0 ~(keystone_admin)]$ system application-apply power-metrics
   

4. If needed, add configmap and volumes via override:

   volumes:
   - name: telegraf-example
     configMap:
       name: telegraf-example
   mountPoints:
   - name: telegraf-example
     mountPath: /path/to/file.json
     subPath: file.json
   

   system helm-override-update power-metrics telegraf power-metrics --values /path/to/file.yaml
   

For more information on Telegraf plugins, see https://github.com/influxdata/telegraf#documentation.

Modify Telegraf data collection interval

Telegraf report its metrics each 10 seconds, but you can modify this time interval with the following command:

system helm-override-update power-metrics telegraf power-metrics --set config.agent.interval=<time-interval>

cAdvisor

Enable and disable Perf Events on cAdvisor

To enable or disable Perf Events on cAdvisor, use the following command:

[sysadmin@controller-0 ~(keystone_admin)]$ system helm-override-update power-metrics cadvisor power-metrics --set perf_events=true
+----------------+-------------------+
| Property       | Value             |
+----------------+-------------------+
| name           | cadvisor          |
| namespace      | power-metrics     |
| user_overrides | perf_events: true |
|                |                   |
+----------------+-------------------+

After that, reapply the power-metrics app, and wait until the pod restarts:

system application-apply power-metrics

Remove the Power Metrics App

To remove the Power metrics app use the following command:

system application-remove power-metrics

Then, use the following command to return the application to the uploaded state:

system application-delete power-metrics

Available Metrics

With Power Metrics application, we have access to system and hardware level raw data, enabling to visualize the power usage.

Power Metrics, by default, exposes the data collected from both, cAdvisor and Telegraf, in the OpenMetrics format.

Thermal Design Power

The Thermal Design Power, or TDP, is the maximum energy available, in watts, for the processor. The metric name for checking the TDP is: powerstat_package_thermal_design_power_watts.

Current Power Consumption

The current power usage of the system in watts. The metric name for checking power consumption is powerstat_package_current_power_consumption_watts.

Current DRAM Power Consumption

The current power usage of dram in the system in watts. The metric name for checking DRAM Consumption is: powerstat_package_current_dram_power_consumption_watts.

Current CPU Frequency

The current CPU frequency of the of the processor. The metric name for checking the CPU frequency is powerstat_core_cpu_frequency_mhz.

CPU Base Frequency

The base frequency (non-turbo) of the processor, it is the default speed of the processor. The metric name for checking cpu base frequency is powerstat_package_cpu_base_frequency_mhz.

Uncore Frequency

The application reports the current, maximum, and minimum frequency. The uncore frequency can be described as the frequency on a processor that is not actually part of its processor core, like memory controller and cache controller.

You can check the current uncore frequency with the following metric name: powerstat_package_uncore_frequency_mhz_cur, for maximum frequency metric name is powerstat_package_uncore_frequency_limit_mhz_max, and for minimum the name powerstat_package_uncore_frequency_limit_mhz_min.

Per-cpu minimum and maximum frequency

The application reports the minimum and maximum frequency that each core of the processor can achieve. It is possible to check the minimum frequency with the metric name linux_cpu_cpuinfo_min_freq or linux_cpu_scaling_min_freq, and maximum with linux_cpu_cpuinfo_max_freq or linux_cpu_scaling_max_freq.

Per-cpu busy frequency

Busy frequency is the frequency of a core that has a high utilization. (confirm this later). It is possible to see the busy frequency with the following metric name powerstat_core_cpu_busy_frequency_mhz.

Per-cpu percentage in C-State

The application can report the time, in percent, that a core of the processor spent in each c-state. c-State is the state of the core, in which it can reduce its power consumption, the higher the c-state the higher the sleep state of the core. We have in the power metrics the following c-states reports:

• C0 state, in this state, the core is executing normally, it is exposed as powerstat_core_cpu_c0_state_residency_percent.

• C1 state, in this state, the core is active but it’s not processing any instructions, it can quickly go back to the C0 state, it is exposed as powerstat_core_cpu_c1_state_residency_percent.

• C6 State, in this state the core is with its voltage reduced (or powered off). This is the highest state. It takes a longer time to go to C0 state, but the power saving is higher. It is exposed as powerstat_core_cpu_c6_state_residency_percent.

Per-cpu current temperature

The application reports the current temperature of each individual core from the processor. The current temperature is exposed as the metric name powerstat_core_cpu_temperature_celsius.

Container perf events total

From cAdvisor it is reported the number of performance events that occurred in a container, it is exposed as container_perf_events_total.

Container perf events scaling ratio

It also reports the scaling ratio, which calculates the ratio of performance events in a container, it is exposed as container_perf_events_scaling_ration.