Collecting Job Metrics

Galaxy can collect various metrics about jobs that it runs. The metrics that can be collected depend on which plugins (described in this section) are enabled. Two galaxy.yml configuration options control the job metrics plugin configuration:

  1. job_metrics: Inline global configuration of job metrics plugins

  2. job_metrics_config_file: Path to a standalone metrics configuration file. Prior to Galaxy 23.2, this was the only way to configure job metrics plugins. It defaults to <config_dir>/job_metrics_conf.xml for legacy reasons, but using the XML syntax is discouraged, YAML (the syntax is the same as job_metrics) is preferred.

If the job_metrics_config_file exists, it overrides anything configured in job_metrics.

Default Job Metrics Configuration

If no configuration is specified, the default is to load only the core plugin:

- type: core

Available Job Metrics Plugins

The list of metrics plugins implemented in the code can be found at lib/galaxy/job_metrics/instrumenters.

core

The core plugin captures the number of cores allocated to the job ($GALAXY_SLOTS), the start and end time of job (in seconds since epoch) and computes the runtime in seconds.

It has no options.

- type: core

cpuinfo

The cpuinfo plugin captures the processor count on the system that that job ran on (note that this may differ from the number of CPUs actually allocated to the job).

The optional verbose option (default: false) captures details (likely far too much) about each CPU, as found in /proc/cpuinfo.

The cpuinfo plugin works on Linux only.

- type: cpuinfo
  verbose: false

meminfo

The meminfo plugin captures the memory information on the system that the job ran on (note that this may differ from the amount of memory actually allocated to the job).

It has no options.

- type: meminfo

hostname

The hostname plugin captures the output of hostname on the system that the job ran on.

It has no options.

- type: hostname

uname

The uname plugin captures the output of uname -a on the system that the job ran on.

It has no options.

- type: uname

env

The env plugin captures environment variables set in the job’s executing environment.

By default, it captures all environment variables, which is likely excessive but may be useful for debugging. The optional variables option can be set to a list of variables to capture (if set). For legacy purposes, this can also be a comma-separated string of variable names.

- type: env
  variables:
    - HOSTNAME
    - SLURM_CPUS_ON_NODE
    - SLURM_JOBID

cgroup

The cgroup plugin captures values set by Linux Control Groups (cgroups). This is most useful if your jobs run in unique per-job Cgroups (as Slurm does if so configured).

Both cgroups version 1 (cgroupsv1) and cgroups version 2 (cgroupsv2) are supported, by default metrics will be collected for whichever version is mounted on the system where the job ran. The optional version option (default: auto) can be used to only generate metrics capture commands in the job script for the specified cgroups version (1 or 2).

By default, only a small set of cgroup parameters will be recorded, the list of which can be found in lib/galaxy/job_metrics/instrumenters/cgroup.py in the Galaxy code. The optional verbose option (default: false) can be set to capture all parameters in the cpu, cpuacct, and memory controllers (cgroups version 1) or cpu and memory controllers (cgroups version 2).

It is also possible to specify exactly which cgroup parameters to capture by setting the optional params option to a list of parameter names (files in the controller directory) to capture. For legacy purposes, this can also be a comma-separated string of cgroup parameter names.

The cgroup plugin works on Linux only.

- type: cgroup
  verbose: false
  version: 2
  params:
    - cpu.stat
    - memory.peak

Overriding the Global Job Metrics Configuration

Individual Galaxy job config environments (destinations) can disable metric collection by setting the metrics parameter on that environment:

execution:
  environments:
    example:
      metrics:
        - type: core
        - type: cpuinfo
        - type: meminfo

Alternatively, a file can be specified:

execution:
  environments:
    example:
      metrics:
       src: path
       path: /srv/galaxy/config/metrics_override.yml

Additional accepted values for src include default and disabled.