A replay schedule adds one or multiple workload captures to a consolidated replay and specifies the order in which the captures will start during replay. A replay schedule must be created before a consolidated replay can be initialized. Multiple replay schedules can be defined for a consolidated replay. During replay initialization, you can select from any of the existing replay schedules.
Replay schedules perform two types of operation:
The first type of operation performed by a replay schedule is to add the participating workload captures to a replay.
When a workload capture is added to a replay schedule, a unique number is returned to identify the workload capture. A workload capture can be added to a replay schedule more than once, as it will be assigned a different capture number each time it is added. The replay schedule will point to the same capture directory each time to avoid a waste of disk space by copying the capture each time it is added.
The second type of operation performed by a replay schedule is to add schedule orders that specify the order in which the participating workload captures will start during replay.
A schedule order defines an order between the start of two workload captures that have been added to the replay schedule. Multiple schedule orders can be added to a replay schedule. For example, assume that a replay schedule has three workload captures added. One schedule order can be added to specify that Capture 2 must wait for Capture 1 to complete before starting. Another schedule order can be added to specify that Capture 3 must wait for Capture 1 to complete before starting. In this case, both Capture 2 and Capture 3 must wait for Capture 1 to complete before starting.
It is possible for a replay schedule to not contain any schedule orders. In this case, all participating workload captures in the replay schedule will start to replay simultaneously when the consolidated replay begins.