Cassandra: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition

Chapter 12. Performance Tuning

In this chapter, we look at how to tune Cassandra to improve performance. There are a variety of settings in the configuration file and on individual tables. Although the default settings are appropriate for many use cases, there might be circumstances in which you need to change them. In this chapter, we look at how and why to make these changes.

We also see how to use the cassandra-stress test tool that ships with Cassandra to generate load against Cassandra and quickly see how it behaves under stress test circumstances. We can then tune Cassandra appropriately and feel confident that we’re ready to deploy to a production environment.

Managing Performance

To be effective at achieving and maintaining a high level of performance in your cluster, it’s helpful to think of managing performance as a process that begins with the architecture of your application and continues through development and operations.

Setting Performance Goals

Before beginning any performance tuning effort, it is important to have clear goals in mind, whether you are just getting started on deploying an application on Cassandra, or maintaining an existing application.

When planning a cluster, it’s important to understand how the cluster will be used: the number of clients, intended usage patterns, expected peak hours, and so on. This will be useful in planning the initial cluster capacity and for planning cluster growth, as we’ll discuss further in Chapter 14.

An important ...