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[Documentation](../../README.md#documentation) → Usage → UBLK
-----
[Читать на русском](ublk.ru.md)
# UBLK
[ublk](https://docs.kernel.org/block/ublk.html) is a new io_uring-based Linux interface
for user-space block device drivers, available since Linux 6.0.
It's not zero-copy, but it's still a fast implementation, outperforming both [NBD](nbd.en.md)
and [VDUSE](qemu.en.md#vduse) iops-wise and may or may not outperform VDUSE in linear I/O MB/s.
ublk also allows to recover devices even if the server (vitastor-ublk process) dies.
## Example performance comparison
TCP (100G), 3 hosts each with 6 NVMe OSDs, 3 replicas, single client
| | direct fio | NBD | VDUSE | UBLK |
|----------------------|-------------|-------------|------------|-------------|
| linear write | 3807 MB/s | 1832 MB/s | 3226 MB/s | 3027 MB/s |
| linear read | 3067 MB/s | 1885 MB/s | 1800 MB/s | 2076 MB/s |
| 4k random write Q128 | 128624 iops | 91060 iops | 94621 iops | 149450 iops |
| 4k random read Q128 | 117769 iops | 153408 iops | 93157 iops | 171987 iops |
| 4k random write Q1 | 8090 iops | 6442 iops | 6316 iops | 7272 iops |
| 4k random read Q1 | 9474 iops | 7200 iops | 6840 iops | 8038 iops |
RDMA (100G), 3 hosts each with 6 NVMe OSDs, 3 replicas, single client
| | direct fio | NBD | VDUSE | UBLK |
|----------------------|-------------|-------------|-------------|-------------|
| linear write | 6998 MB/s | 1878 MB/s | 4249 MB/s | 3140 MB/s |
| linear read | 8628 MB/s | 3389 MB/s | 5062 MB/s | 3674 MB/s |
| 4k random write Q128 | 222541 iops | 181589 iops | 138281 iops | 218222 iops |
| 4k random read Q128 | 412647 iops | 239987 iops | 151663 iops | 269583 iops |
| 4k random write Q1 | 11601 iops | 8592 iops | 9111 iops | 10000 iops |
| 4k random read Q1 | 10102 iops | 7788 iops | 8111 iops | 8965 iops |
## Commands
vitastor-ublk supports the following commands:
- [map](#map)
- [unmap](#unmap)
- [ls](#ls)
## map
To create a local block device for a Vitastor image run:
```
vitastor-ublk map [/dev/ublkbN] --image testimg
```
It will output a block device name like /dev/ublkb0 which you can then use as a normal disk.
You can also use `--pool <POOL> --inode <INODE> --size <SIZE>` instead of `--image <IMAGE>` if you want.
vitastor-ublk supports all usual Vitastor configuration options like `--config_path <path_to_config>` plus ublk-specific:
* `--recover` \
Recover a mapped device if the previous ublk server is dead.
* `--queue_depth 256` \
Maximum queue size for the device.
* `--max_io_size 1M` \
Maximum single I/O size for the device. Default: `max(1 MB, pool block size * EC part count)`.
* `--readonly` \
Make the device read-only.
* `--hdd` \
Mark the device as rotational.
* `--logfile /path/to/log/file.txt` \
Write log messages to the specified file instead of dropping them (in background mode)
or printing them to the standard output (in foreground mode).
* `--dev_num N` \
Use the specified device /dev/ublkbN instead of automatic selection (alternative syntax
to /dev/ublkbN positional parameter).
* `--foreground 1` \
Stay in foreground, do not daemonize.
Note that `ublk_queue_depth` and `ublk_max_io_size` may also be specified
in `/etc/vitastor/vitastor.conf` or in other configuration file specified with `--config_path`.
## unmap
To unmap the device run:
```
vitastor-ublk unmap /dev/ublkb0
```
## ls
```
vitastor-ublk ls [--json]
```
List mapped images.
Example output (normal format):
```
/dev/ublkb0
image: bench
pid: 584536
/dev/ublkb1
image: bench1
pid: 584546
```
Example output (JSON format):
```
{"/dev/ublkb0": {"image": "bench", "pid": 584536}, "/dev/ublkb1": {"image": "bench1", "pid": 584546}}
```