The dlstat and flowstat commands are tools for monitoring and obtaining statistics on network traffic on datalinks and flows, respectively. These commands parallel the dladm and flowadm commands. The following table shows the parallelism between the pair of *adm commands and the pair of *stat commands and their respective functions:
| Command | Function |
| dladm command options | User interface and tool for configuring and administering datalinks. |
| flowadm command options | User interface and tool for configuring and administering flows. |
| Command | Function |
| dlstat command options | User interface and tool for obtaining statistics on traffic on datalinks. |
| flowstat command options | User interface and tool for obtaining statistics on traffic on flows. |
The following variants of the dlstat command can be used to gather network traffic information:
- dlstat – Displays general information about packets that are being received or transmitted by a system.
- dlstat show-phys – Displays information about the use of receive and transmit rings. This command corresponds to the dladm show-phys command, which displays non-traffic information about a network physical device.
- dlstat show-link – Displays detailed information about traffic flow on a given lane. The lane is identified by its datalink. This command corresponds to the dladm show-link and dladm show-vnic commands, which display non-traffic information about datalinks.
- dlstat show-aggr – Displays information about the use of ports in a link aggregation. This command corresponds to the dladm show-aggr command, which displays non-traffic information about a link aggregation.
How to Obtain Basic Statistics About Network Traffic
- Become an administrator.
- Observe basic traffic flow over all the datalinks.
# dlstat [-r|-t] [-i interval] [link]
[-r|-t]
Displays either receive-side statistics only (-r option) or transmit-side statistics only (-t option). If you do not use these options, then statistics for both the receive-side and the transmit-side are displayed.-i interval
Specifies the time in seconds at which you want the displayed statistics to be refreshed. If you do not use this option, then static output is displayed.link
Indicates that you want to monitor the statistics of the specified datalink only. If you do not use this option, then information about all datalinks is displayed.
Used by itself, the dlstat command displays information about incoming and outgoing packets on all configured datalinks.
The following information is displayed by most of the options that you use with the dlstat command:
- Links in the system that have been configured with IP interfaces and that can receive or transmit traffic
- Packet and byte sizes
- Interrupts and MAC polling statistics
- Packet chain lengths
Example – Displaying Basic Receive-Side and Transmit-Side Statistics
This example shows information about network traffic that is being received and sent on all configured datalinks on the system.
# dlstat LINK IPKTS RBYTES OPKTS OBYTES e1000g0 101.88K 32.86M 40.16K 4.37M nxge1 4.50M 6.78G 1.38M 90.90M vnic1 8 336 0 0
Example – Displaying Receive-Side Statistics at One-Second Intervals
This example shows information about traffic that is being received on all datalinks. The information is refreshed every second. To stop the display from refreshing, press Control-C.
# dlstat -r -i 1 LINK IPKTS RBYTES INTRS POLLS CH<10 CH10-50 CH>50 e1000g0 101.91K 32.86M 87.56K 14.35K 3.70K 205 5 nxge1 9.61M 14.47G 5.79M 3.82M 379.98K 85.66K 1.64K vnic1 8 336 0 0 0 0 0 e1000g0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 nxge1 82.13K 123.69M 50.00K 32.13K 3.17K 724 24 vnic1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ... ^C
In this output, the statistics for interrupt (INTRS) are significant. Low interrupt numbers indicate greater efficiency in performance. If the interrupt numbers are high, then you might need to add more resources to the specific link.
Example – Displaying Transmit-Side Statistics at Five-Second Intervals
This example displays information about traffic that is being sent on all datalinks. The information is refreshed every 5 seconds.
# dlstat -t -i 5 LINK OPKTS OBYTES BLKCNT UBLKCNT e1000g0 40.24K 4.37M 0 0 nxge1 9.76M 644.14M 0 0 vnic1 0 0 0 0 e1000g0 0 0 0 0 nxge1 26.82K 1.77M 0 0 vnic1 0 0 0 0 ... ^C
How to Obtain Statistics About Ring Usage
- Become an administrator.
- Display ring statistics.
# dlstat show-phys [-r|-t] [-i interval] [link]
[-r|-t]
Displays either receive-side statistics only (-r option) or transmit-side statistics only (-t option). If you do not use these options, then statistics for both the receive-side and the transmit-side are displayed.-i interval
Specifies the time in seconds at which you want the displayed statistics to be refreshed. If you do not use this option, then static output is displayed.link
Indicates that you want to monitor the statistics of the specified datalink only. If you do not use this option, then information about all datalinks is displayed.
Used by itself, the dlstat show-phys command displays information about incoming and outgoing packets on all configured datalinks.
Example – Displaying Receive-Ring Statistics for a Datalink
This example shows the usage of the receive rings for the datalink.
# dlstat show-phys -r nxge1
LINK TYPE INDEX IPKTS RBYTES
nxge1 rx 0 21 1.79K
nxge1 rx 1 0 0
nxge1 rx 2 1.39M 2.10G
nxge1 rx 3 0 0
nxge1 rx 4 6.81M 10.26G
nxge1 rx 5 4.63M 6.97G
nxge1 rx 6 3.97M 5.98G
nxge1 rx 7 0 0
The nxge device has eight receive rings, which are identified under the INDEX field. An even distribution of packets per ring is an ideal configuration that indicates that the rings are properly allocated to links according to the links’ load. An uneven distribution might indicate a disproportionate distribution of rings per link. The resolution depends on whether the NIC supports dynamic ring allocation, which allows you to redistribute rings per link.
Example – Displaying Transmit Ring Statistics of a Datalink
This example shows the usage of the transmit rings for the datalink.
# dlstat show-phys -t nxge1 LINK TYPE INDEX OPKTS OBYTES nxge1 tx 0 44 3.96K nxge1 tx 1 0 0 nxge1 tx 2 1.48M 121.68M nxge1 tx 3 2.45M 201.11M nxge1 tx 4 1.47M 120.82M nxge1 tx 5 0 0 nxge1 tx 6 1.97M 161.57M nxge1 tx 7 4.59M 376.21M nxge1 tx 8 2.43M 199.24M nxge1 tx 9 0 0 nxge1 tx 10 3.23M 264.69M nxge1 tx 11 1.88M 153.96M
How to Obtain Statistics About Network Traffic on Lanes
- Become an administrator.
- Display statistics about network lanes.
# dlstat show-link [-r [F]|-t] [-i interval] [link]
[-r|-t]
Displays either receive-side statistics only (-r option) or transmit-side statistics only (-t option). If you do not use these options, then statistics for both the receive-side and the transmit-side are displayed.-i interval
Specifies the time in seconds at which you want the displayed statistics to be refreshed. If you do not use this option, then static output is displayed.link
Indicates that you want to monitor the statistics of the specified datalink only. If you do not use this option, then information about all datalinks is displayed.
If ring grouping is supported and dedicated rings were configured, then hardware lane statistics are displayed. If no dedicated rings are configured, then software lane statistics are displayed.
Example – Displaying Receive-Side Statistics for a Lane
This example shows the following information:
- How packets are received on a hardware lane
- How packets are received on a software lane
- How packets are received on a software lane and fanned out to assigned CPUs
The following command shows receive-side statistics for the specific link. The information indicates ring usage. However, the data might also reflect the implementation of other resource allocations, such as bandwidth limits and priority processing.
# dlstat show-link -r nxge1 LINK TYPE ID INDEX IPKTS RBYTES INTRS POLLS CH<10 CH10-50 CH>50 nxge1 rx local -- 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 nxge1 rx hw 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 nxge1 rx hw 2 1.73M 2.61G 1.33M 400.22K 67.03K 7.49K 38 nxge1 rx hw 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 nxge1 rx hw 4 8.44M 12.71G 4.35M 4.09M 383.28K 91.24K 2.09K nxge1 rx hw 5 5.68M 8.56G 3.72M 1.97M 203.68K 43.94K 854 nxge1 rx hw 6 4.90M 7.38G 3.11M 1.80M 168.59K 42.34K 620 nxge1 rx hw 7 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
The following command shows receive-side statistics for the specific link. In the output, the ID field indicates whether hardware rings are exclusively assigned or shared among clients. In the ixgbe card, Rx rings are shared if other clients such as VNICs are configured over the link as well. Thus, for this specific example, Rx rings are shared, as indicated by the sw value under the ID field.
# dlstat show-link -r ixgbe0 LINK TYPE ID INDEX IPKTS RBYTES INTRS POLLS CH<10 CH10-50 CH>50 ixgbe0 rx local -- 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ixgbe0 rx sw -- 794.28K 1.19G 794.28K 0 0 0 0
The following command shows usage of receive-side statistics for the specific link. In addition, with the use of the -F option in the command, the output also provides fanout information. Specifically, the fanout count is two (0 and 1). Network traffic that is received on the hardware lane that uses ring 0 is split and passed on across the two fanouts. Likewise, network traffic that is received on the hardware lane that uses ring 1 is also split and divided across the two fanouts.
# dlstat show-link -r -F nxge1 LINK ID INDEX FOUT IPKTS nxge1 local -- 0 0 nxge1 hw 0 0 382.47K nxge1 hw 0 1 0 nxge1 hw 1 0 367.50K nxge1 hw 1 1 433.24K
Example – Displaying Transmit-Side Statistics for a Lane
The following example shows statistics about outbound packets on a specific lane.
# dlstat show-link -t nxge1 LINK TYPE ID INDEX OPKTS OBYTES BLKCNT UBLKCNT nxge1 tx hw 0 32 1.44K 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 1 0 0 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 2 1.48M 97.95M 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 3 2.45M 161.87M 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 4 1.47M 97.25M 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 5 0 276 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 6 1.97M 130.25M 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 7 4.59M 302.80M 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 8 2.43M 302.80M 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 9 0 0 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 10 3.23M 213.05M 0 0 nxge1 tx hw 11 1.88M 123.93M 0 0