TL;DR

• Finch benchmarks MySQL; other databases are not currently supported.
• Benchmarks are written in SQL; write your queries in a .sql file.
• Each SQL file is a Finch trx—“trx” for short.
• Trx should model real MySQL transactions, but they don’t have to.
• In SQL statements, data keys like @d inject fake/random/test data.
• Data keys are configured in stage files to use a data generator.
• Data generators are plugins that generate data (e.g. random numbers).
• At least one stage file is required to configure and run Finch.
• A benchmark comprises one or more stages (defined by stage files).
• After writing SQL files with data keys, write a stage file to configure and execute.
• Statistics are reported once at the end by default; periodic stats can be enabled.
• Stats reporters are plugins, so you can report stats any way, any where.
• Look in benchmarks/sysbench/ for a complete and familiar example.