Garbage Collection Configuration
Garbage collection is configured via the following system variables:
GC I/O limit
TiKV supports the GC I/O limit. You can configure gc.max-write-bytes-per-sec to limit writes of a GC worker per second, and thus to reduce the impact on normal requests.
0 indicates disabling this feature.
You can dynamically modify this configuration using tikv-ctl:
tikv-ctl --host=ip:port modify-tikv-config -n gc.max-write-bytes-per-sec -v 10MB
Changes in TiDB 5.0
In previous releases of TiDB, garbage collection was configured via the mysql.tidb system table. While changes to this table continue to be supported, it is recommended to use the system variables provided. This helps ensure that any changes to configuration can be validated, and prevent unexpected behavior (#20655).
The CENTRAL garbage collection mode is no longer supported. The DISTRIBUTED GC mode (which has been the default since TiDB 3.0) will automatically be used in its place. This mode is more efficient, since TiDB no longer needs to send requests to each TiKV region to trigger garbage collection.
For information on changes in previous releases, refer to earlier versions of this document using the TIDB version selector in the left hand menu.
GC in Compaction Filter
Since v5.0, TiDB introduces the mechanism of GC in Compaction Filter. Based on the DISTRIBUTED GC mode, the mechanism of GC in Compaction Filter uses the compaction process of RocksDB, instead of a separate GC worker thread, to run GC. This new GC mechanism helps to avoid extra disk read caused by GC. Also, after clearing the obsolete data, it avoids a large number of left tombstone marks which degrade the sequential scan performance.
In v5.0 RC, the mechanism is disabled by default. Since v5.0 GA, this mechanism is enabled by default.
The following example shows how to enable the mechanism in the TiKV configuration file:
[gc]
enable-compaction-filter = true
You can also enable this GC mechanism by modifying the configuration online. See the following example:
show config where type = 'tikv' and name like '%enable-compaction-filter%';
+------+-------------------+-----------------------------+-------+
| Type | Instance | Name | Value |
+------+-------------------+-----------------------------+-------+
| tikv | 172.16.5.37:20163 | gc.enable-compaction-filter | false |
| tikv | 172.16.5.36:20163 | gc.enable-compaction-filter | false |
| tikv | 172.16.5.35:20163 | gc.enable-compaction-filter | false |
+------+-------------------+-----------------------------+-------+
set config tikv gc.enable-compaction-filter = true;
show config where type = 'tikv' and name like '%enable-compaction-filter%';
+------+-------------------+-----------------------------+-------+
| Type | Instance | Name | Value |
+------+-------------------+-----------------------------+-------+
| tikv | 172.16.5.37:20163 | gc.enable-compaction-filter | true |
| tikv | 172.16.5.36:20163 | gc.enable-compaction-filter | true |
| tikv | 172.16.5.35:20163 | gc.enable-compaction-filter | true |
+------+-------------------+-----------------------------+-------+