I don't have enough experience with Java or PHP under IBM i or Windows to comment on their relative performance, but IBM recently submitted results for the SAP Sales Order benchmark, using a 4-CPU 16-Core 16-Thread Power Server, running AIX, which handled 341 requests per second. HP submitted their results one month after, using a 4-CPU 24-Core 24-Thread server, running Windows, which handled 425 requests per second. It's a J2EE Java benchmark.
I benchmarked my ILE based Purchase Order application, using a 1-CPU 1-Core 1-Thread, year 2006 era server, which handled about 500 requests per second. It may not be the same benchmark, but all requests generated dynamic content, most performed DB I/O, about 1/4th performed stream file I/O, and all required Apache HTTP server socket I/O.
What it comes down to is that it appears to me that IBM i doesn't have a lot of overhead for ILE based Web applications.
Nathan.
----- Original Message ----
From: Scott Klement <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: Midrange Systems Technical Discussion <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wed, December 9, 2009 5:08:32 PM
Subject: Re: Would it be a reasonable to ask IBM's programmers to, write a %sortsfl(sfl: column)
Nathan Andelin wrote:
I agree with you that IBM i installation procedures are a pain. But
I question your assertion about Apache, Java, WebSphere, Tomcat, PHP,
TCP/IP, and stream file operations performing poorly under IBM i
compared to other platforms. My personal benchmarking is a bit
limited, but tends to indicate that stream file & socket I/O is quite
comparable between IBM i and Wintel equivalents. If you have other
information, I'd be interested in hearing about it.
That has not been my experience at all. I haven't done actual
benchmarks, but I can take the same Java program or PHP script and run
it on i vs. running it on Windows or FreeBSD, and the Windows/FreeBSD
copies are visibly faster.
Likewise, I've worked extensively with IFS. When doing heavy disk
access, I see visible and noticeable speed differences from IFS vs. NTFS
on Windows or UFS on BSD. If I'm careful about how I code my IFS
routines, I can get acceptable performance on i, but certainly not the
same speed I can get elsewhere.
I don't know what in the OS causes this, and I'm not sure what to blame
it on. You guys know I'm a supporter of this platform. I just wish IBM
would solve some of these problems. And it drives me absolutely nuts
when people talk about OS/400 being great, and RPG being the cause of
the problem, when it's the total opposite in my opinion. RPG is really
the saving grace of this system. It's the main reason it's still useful.
The remarkable thing about IBM i is not it's support for 5250
interfaces, but rather it's ability to handle complex workloads
efficiently and reliability. That may not do much for Java and PHP,
but it works for ILE based Web applications.
Amen to that! I certainly wasn't the one putting down ILE... Again, I
think RPG (and by that I think ILE is implied) is the main attraction of
this system. That and DB2, of course.
The reliability and maintainability of the system is another strong
point, of course.
midrange.com
