CSC/ECE 506 Fall 2007/wiki1 3 as1506

Commercial computers, since long, have been using parallel architectures for its high end applications. However unlike the requirements of scientific or engineering computing where majority of the work done depends on the computing ability, commercial applications require that the system supports maximum number of transactions at any given time so that it can support large databases and service large number of customers. The class of such systems is referred to on-line transaction processing.

TPC benchmarks

The goal of TPC benchmarks is to define a set of functional requirements that can be run on any transaction processing system, regardless of hardware or operating system. This methodology allows any vendor, using "proprietary" or "open" systems, to implement the TPC benchmark and guarantees to end-users that they will see an apples-to-apples comparison.

One of the OLTP system benchmark in this suite, the TPC-C, simulates a complete environment where a population of terminal operators executes transactions against a database. The benchmark is centered around the principal activities (transactions) of an order-entry environment. These transactions include entering and delivering orders, recording payments, checking the status of orders, and monitoring the level of stock at the warehouses.

The throughput of TPC-C is a direct result of the level of activity at the terminals. Each system has ten terminals and all five transactions are available at each terminal. A remote terminal emulator (RTE) is used to maintain the required mix of transactions over the performance measurement period. This mix represents the complete business processing of an order as it is entered, paid for, checked, and delivered. More specifically, the required mix is defined to produce an equal number of New-Order and Payment transactions and to produce one Delivery transaction, one Order-Status transaction, and one Stock-Level transaction for every ten New-Order transactions.

The tpm-C metric is the number of New-Order transactions executed per minute. Given the required mix and the wide range of complexity and types among the transactions, this metric more closely simulates a complete business activity, not just one or two transactions or computer operations. For this reason, the tpm-C metric is considered to be a measure of business throughput. The tpm-C, does not just measure a few basic computer or database transactions, but measures how many complete business operations can be processed per minute. This new benchmark should give users a more extensive, more complex yardstick for measuring OLTP system performance.

The current version of TPC-C benchmark is Version 5.9. Compared to the version mentioned in the text, pricing changes included reducing maintenance support pricing to 3 years down from 5 years, 24x7 maintenance up from 8x5, removing terminal network pricing (hubs, switches), and allowing pricing quotes from web pages and print materials. Runtime changes included reducing the disk space requirements to 60 days from 180 days, increasing the measurement interval to 2 hours up from 20 minutes, reporting checkpoint durations, and reporting the number of lost connections of users during the measurement interval.