ioload

A wrapper for iostat that displays I/O statistics in a real-time chart format similar to nload, with the ability to switch between devices using keyboard navigation.

🎯 Features

• Real-time visualization - Live I/O statistics with smooth updates
• Multiple chart views - IOPS, Throughput, Utilization, and Wait Times
• Keyboard navigation - Switch devices and views with arrow keys
• Color-coded charts - Easy-to-read terminal charts with color support
• Cross-platform - Works on Linux and macOS (Unix-like systems)
• Lightweight - Minimal dependencies, fast startup

Features

• Real-time I/O statistics visualization
• Multiple charts showing:
  • Read/Write IOPS (requests per second)
  • Read/Write Throughput (KB/s)
  • Device Utilization (%)
  • Average wait times
• Switch between devices using < (previous) and > (next) keys
• Clean, terminal-based interface using curses

Used by

• Ring.cr

Sponsored by

• Ring.cr

Requirements

• Python 3.8+
• iostat command (part of sysstat package)
  • On macOS: brew install sysstat
  • On Linux: Usually pre-installed or available via package manager
• asciichartpy Python library for chart rendering
  • Install with: pip install asciichartpy

Installation

Quick Install (Recommended)

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/guntanis/ioload/main/scripts/install.sh | bash

Manual Installation

See docs/INSTALL.md for detailed manual installation instructions.

Usage

./ioload.py

Or:

python3 ioload.py

You can specify a custom refresh interval (in seconds):

./ioload.py -i 0.5  # Refresh every 0.5 seconds
./ioload.py --interval 2.0  # Refresh every 2 seconds

Controls

• Left Arrow or <: Switch to previous device
• Right Arrow or >: Switch to next device
• Up Arrow: Switch to previous chart view
• Down Arrow: Switch to next chart view
• Q: Quit the application

How it works

The tool continuously runs iostat -x in the background to collect I/O statistics for all block devices. It maintains a rolling history of the last 60 data points and displays them as ASCII charts in real-time.

The charts show:

• Read/Write IOPS: Combined visualization of read and write requests per second
• Read/Write Throughput: Combined visualization of read and write data transfer rates
• Utilization: Device utilization percentage over time

📸 Screenshots

(Add screenshots or animated GIFs here showing ioload in action)

🤝 Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please read our Contributing Guide for details on our code of conduct and the process for submitting pull requests.

📝 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

🙏 Acknowledgments

• Inspired by nload and htop
• Uses asciichartpy for beautiful terminal charts
• Built with Python's curses library

📁 Project Structure

ioload/
├── docs/          # Additional documentation
├── scripts/       # Installation scripts
├── tests/         # Test files
└── ioload.py      # Main application

See PROJECT_STRUCTURE.md for details.

📚 Related Projects

• nload - Network traffic monitor
• htop - Interactive process viewer
• iotop - I/O monitoring tool

⭐ Star History

If you find this project useful, please consider giving it a star on GitHub!

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Made with ❤️ by the ioload contributors