Blogs
Monitoring Event Loops for Blockages
Chronicle’s open source Chronicle Threads library has a little known feature which is one of the first tools I get from my bag if a client reports that they are seeing latency outliers. The usual way that a developer will measure their system for latency hotspots is to use a profiler, and modern profilers are…
Read MoreMonitoring Chronicle Services
Chronicle Services is a framework for building Event-driven microservices. Microservices built with Chronicle Services are efficient, easy to build, test, and maintain. Equally important they provide exceptional high-throughput and low latency. Monitoring and observability is a first class feature of the framework, and comes “for free” i.e. it requires no effort from the application developer,…
Read MoreLarge Price Comparison: 55 Dedicated Cloud Compute Optimised Solutions
Dedicated compute optimised instances deliver high performance for compute-bound applications in the cloud. They are, therefore, ideal for low latency applications like Chronicle’s software. However, which one gives the best bang for one’s buck in terms of performance? To find out, I made a comparison of 55 vendors’ cheapest instances and the price of…
Read MoreUsing Pausers in Event Loops
Typically in low-latency development, a trade-off must be made between minimising latency and avoiding excessive CPU utilisation. This article explores how Chronicle’s Pausers can be used to automatically apply a back-off strategy when there is no data to be processed, providing an excellent balance between resource usage and responsive, low-latency, low-jitter applications. Description of the…
Read MoreTuning Java Applications for Low Latency on Linux
Introduction I have lost count of the number of times I have been told that Java is not a suitable language in which to develop applications where performance is a major consideration. My first response is usually to ask for clarification on what is actually meant by “performance” as two of the most common measures…
Read MoreThe Unix Philosophy for Low Latency
Unix has been around for more than 50 years, and the original design principles must be good enough for it (and its derivative, Linux) to be the most widely used Operating System on the planet – 80% of servers, most supercomputers, and the most deployed OS (Android). It is also the most popular OS on…
Read MoreComparing Approaches to Durability in Low Latency Messaging Queues
A significant feature of Chronicle Queue Enterprise is support for TCP replication across multiple servers to ensure high availability of application infrastructure. I have generally held the view that replicating data to a secondary system is faster than sync-ing to disk, assuming the round trip network delay wasn’t high due to quality networks and co-located…
Read MoreAutomatically Creating Microservices Architecture Diagrams
In application development, microservices is an architectural style where larger applications are structured as a collection of smaller, independent, yet interconnected services. While this allows for highly maintainable and testable applications (as each service can be maintained independent of the larger application), the problem with this method is the inherent complexity of interactions between microservices.…
Read MoreChronicle FIX: Much More Than a Quick Fix
Many of our customers have upgraded from QuickFIX/J to Chronicle FIX and this article provides some background as to why. Introduction QuickFIX/J is free, accessible, supports the FIX standard and is therefore often chosen by the IT team for a first FIX engine. However, when the business grows, its limitations become clear. The reasons most…
Read MoreChronicle FIX: Designed Not To Skip A Message Even If Your Data Centre Fails
A high level of availability of IT services is crucial to prevent disruptions of service that can lead to financial losses, business opportunity losses, data loss, and reputational damage. A business’s downtime cost can vary depending on its size, nature and the length of the downtime. Studies by Network Computing, the Meta Group, and Contingency…
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