MySQL load/stress testing

I am going to do load testing on mysql server, could someone recommend good metrics to concentrate on? Any automated way(read software) of getting/tracking them?

Thank you!

Solution 1:

If you are looking to concentrate on MySql metrics, I highly recommend you utilize mysqlreport. It's available here and will generate alot of information as well as provides a How-To interpret the results.

Link: http://hackmysql.com/mysqlreport

Solution 2:

For stress testing you should give MySQL Super Smack a go.

Super Smack is a benchmarking, stress testing, and load generation tool for MySQL (and PostgreSQL). Super Smack was originally written by Sasha Pachev, and then hosted and maintained by Jeremy Zawodny.

As well as MySQLReport mention by @jeffp711, you should keep a close eye on your OS level stats using mpstat, vmstat and iostat

Solution 3:

The best metric is "how fast does your production queries run". MySQL server performance is 99% governed by how good your schema and queries are.