How To Install Sysbench on Debian 12

In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Sysbench on Debian 12. Sysbench is a powerful and versatile benchmarking tool that allows you to evaluate the performance of your Linux system. Whether you need to test your CPU, memory, file I/O, or database performance, Sysbench provides a comprehensive set of features to help you assess and optimize your system’s capabilities.

This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you the step-by-step installation of the Sysbench benchmarking tool on Debian 12 (Bookworm).

Prerequisites

Before proceeding with the installation of Sysbench on Debian 12, ensure you meet the following requirements:

• A server running one of the following operating systems: Debian 12 (Bookworm).
• It’s recommended that you use a fresh OS install to prevent any potential issues.
• SSH access to the server (or just open Terminal if you’re on a desktop).
• An active internet connection. You’ll need an internet connection to download the necessary packages and dependencies for the Sysbench.
• A user account with sudo privileges to execute administrative commands.

Install Sysbench on Debian 12 Bookworm

Step 1. To begin, we need to update the package index and install a few essential dependencies. Open your terminal and run the following commands:

sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade

Step 2. Installing Sysbench on Debian 12.

• Installing Sysbench from Debian Repositories.

Once the package list is updated, install Sysbench by executing the following command:

sudo apt install sysbench

After the installation is complete, you can verify the installed version of Sysbench by running:

sysbench --version

This command will display the version number of Sysbench installed on your system.

It’s important to note that the version of Sysbench available in the Debian repositories may be an older but stable release. If you require the latest features and improvements, you can consider the other installation methods described in the following sections.

• Installing the Latest Sysbench Release using Packagecloud.

If you want to install the latest version of Sysbench on your Debian 12 system, you can use the Packagecloud repository. Packagecloud is a reliable source that hosts the most recent releases of Sysbench. Follow these steps to install Sysbench using Packagecloud:

curl -s https://packagecloud.io/install/repositories/akopytov/sysbench/script.deb.sh | sudo bash

Once the repository is added, you can install Sysbench using the standard apt command:

sudo apt install sysbench

After the installation is complete, you can verify the installed version of Sysbench by running:

sysbench --version

This command will display the version number of Sysbench installed from the Packagecloud repository.

• Building and Installing Sysbench from Source.

In certain scenarios, you may need to build Sysbench from its source code. This is particularly useful when you have an unsupported architecture or require a custom build with specific features or optimizations. Building Sysbench from source provides you with greater flexibility and control over the installation process. Here’s how you can build and install Sysbench from source on Debian 12:

First, install the necessary build tools and dependencies by running the following command:

sudo apt install make automake libtool pkg-config

If you plan to use Sysbench with MySQL, you’ll need to install additional dependencies. Run the following command to install the MySQL development libraries:

sudo apt install libmysqlclient-dev libssl-dev

Download the Sysbench source code from the official GitHub repository. You can use the following commands to download and extract the source code:

wget https://github.com/akopytov/sysbench/archive/refs/tags/1.0.20.tar.gz
tar -xf 1.0.20.tar.gz
cd sysbench-1.0.20

Once you are in the Sysbench source directory, you can start the build process. Run the following commands to configure and compile Sysbench:

./autogen.sh
./configure
make

After the build process is complete, you can install Sysbench by running:

sudo make install

Verify the installation by checking the installed version of Sysbench:

sysbench --version

If you ever need to uninstall the custom Sysbench build, you can navigate to the source directory and run:

sudo make uninstall

Step 3.  Basic Sysbench Usage and Example Benchmarks.

Now that you have Sysbench installed on your Debian 12 system, let’s explore some basic usage examples and run a few benchmarks to demonstrate its capabilities.

• CPU Benchmark:

To test your system’s CPU performance, you can run the following command:

sysbench cpu run

Sysbench will perform a series of CPU-intensive tests and provide a report on the CPU performance metrics.

• File I/O Benchmark:

Sysbench can also benchmark your system’s file I/O performance. To run a file I/O benchmark, you need to prepare the test files first:

sysbench fileio prepare

Once the test files are prepared, you can run the file I/O benchmark using:

sysbench fileio run

Sysbench will measure the file I/O performance and provide a detailed report.

• MySQL Benchmark:

If you have MySQL installed on your system, you can use Sysbench to benchmark its performance. Before running the benchmark, you need to create a test database and user. Use the following commands to create the necessary database and user:

mysql -u root -p -e "CREATE DATABASE sbtest;"
mysql -u root -p -e "CREATE USER 'sbtest'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'your-strong password';"
mysql -u root -p -e "GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON sbtest.* TO 'sbtest'@'localhost';"

Replace ‘your-strong-password‘ with a secure password of your choice. Next, prepare the test database by running:

sysbench oltp_read_only prepare

This command will populate the test database with sample data. Now, you can run the MySQL benchmark using:

sysbench oltp_read_only run

Sysbench will perform a read-only workload on the MySQL database and provide performance metrics.

After running the benchmark, it’s important to clean up the test database. Use the following command to remove the test data:

sysbench oltp_read_only cleanup

This command will delete the test tables and data from the MySQL database.

Congratulations! You have successfully installed Sysbench. Thanks for using this tutorial to install the latest version of the Sysbench benchmarking tool on Debian 12 Bookworm. For additional help or useful information, we recommend you check the official Sysbench website.