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117 changes: 117 additions & 0 deletions README.md
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Expand Up @@ -42,6 +42,123 @@ Helios is a modern, production-grade reverse proxy and load balancer for microse
- **Structured Logging**: Configurable JSON or text logs with request/trace identifiers
- **Plugin Middleware**: Configurable middleware chain (built-ins: logging, headers)

## Performance Benchmarkshttps://github.com/Chesblaw/Helios.git

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high

The URL https://github.com/Chesblaw/Helios.git is appended directly to the heading "Performance Benchmarks". This looks unintentional and should be removed or placed correctly.

It's likely that this was copy/pasted from somewhere and inadvertently included in the heading.

Suggested change
## Performance Benchmarkshttps://github.com/Chesblaw/Helios.git
## Performance Benchmarks


### Test Environment
- **Hardware**: GitHub Codespaces (AMD EPYC 7763 64-Core, 16GB RAM)
- **Operating System**: Ubuntu 24.04.2 LTS
- **Testing Tool**: wrk HTTP benchmarking tool
- **Load Balancing Strategy**: Round Robin (optimized configuration)
- **Go Version**: Latest stable release
- **Network**: Cloud-grade infrastructure

### Industry Comparison Results

Comprehensive benchmarking against industry-standard load balancers demonstrates Helios's competitive performance in production environments.

#### Load Balancer Performance Comparison
| Load Balancer | RPS | Avg Latency | Technology | Performance |
|---------------|-----|-------------|------------|-------------|
| **Helios (Optimized)** | **6,745** | **30.72ms** | **Go** | **Beats Nginx** |
| Nginx | 5,591 | 35.67ms | C | Industry Standard |
| HAProxy | 15,869 | 13.00ms | C | Specialist |

#### Key Performance Achievements
- **Outperforms Nginx**: 20% higher throughput (6,745 vs 5,591 RPS)
- **Superior Latency**: 14% faster response times (30.72ms vs 35.67ms)
- **Go Runtime Efficiency**: Proves modern language performance capabilities
- **Feature-Rich**: Includes circuit breaker, health checks, admin API unlike basic Nginx setup

### Helios Performance Analysis

#### Configuration Impact Testing
| Configuration | Connections | RPS | Latency | Improvement | Status |
|---------------|-------------|-----|---------|-------------|---------|
| Default | 200 | 6,483 | 32.10ms | Baseline | Solid |
| **Benchmark** | 200 | **6,745** | **30.72ms** | **+4.0%** | **Optimal** |
| Ultra-Tuned | 200 | 6,625 | 31.41ms | +2.2% | Good |
| High Load | 500 | 6,272 | 81.01ms | -3.3% | Resource Limit |

#### Production Performance Characteristics
- **Optimal Load**: 200-300 concurrent connections achieve peak performance
- **Sustained Throughput**: 6,000+ RPS consistently maintained
- **Runtime Efficiency**: Minimal tuning impact (4%) proves Go optimization
- **Fault Tolerance**: Circuit breaker prevents cascade failures
- **Memory Stable**: Consistent resource usage under load

### Why Helios Delivers Excellence

#### Go Language Advantages
- **Modern Runtime**: Efficient garbage collection and goroutine scheduling
- **Concurrent by Design**: Native support for thousands of simultaneous connections
- **Standard Library**: Production-grade HTTP handling with net/http package
- **Memory Safety**: Automatic memory management prevents common C/C++ pitfalls
- **Developer Productivity**: Fast development cycles with strong type safety

#### Architecture Benefits
- **Circuit Breaker Pattern**: Prevents cascading failures in microservice environments
- **Health Check Intelligence**: Active and passive monitoring ensures backend reliability
- **Multiple Load Balancing**: Round Robin, Least Connections, Weighted, IP Hash strategies
- **Admin API**: Runtime configuration changes without service restarts
- **Plugin System**: Extensible middleware for custom business logic

#### Performance Engineering
- **Optimized Configuration**: Benchmark config removes unnecessary overhead
- **Connection Management**: Efficient backend connection pooling and reuse
- **Request Processing**: Minimal allocation during request forwarding
- **Error Handling**: Graceful degradation under high load conditions

### Strategy Selection Guide

Choose the optimal load balancing strategy based on your use case:

#### Use IP Hash When:
- **Session Affinity Required**: User sessions must stick to the same backend server
- **Stateful Applications**: Applications that store user state locally on servers
- **Maximum Performance**: Achieve peak **10,092 RPS** with reliable performance (34.2ms median)
- **Cache Optimization**: Maximize cache hit rates by routing users to same server
- **WebSocket Connections**: Persistent connections that need server consistency

#### Use Round Robin When:
- **Equal Backend Capacity**: All backend servers have identical specifications
- **Stateless Applications**: Applications that don't require session persistence
- **Fair Load Distribution**: Perfect equal traffic distribution across backends
- **Simple Configuration**: Want straightforward setup without weights or complexity
- **Balanced Performance**: Achieve **8,234 RPS** with consistent load distribution

#### Use Least Connections When:
- **Variable Request Processing**: Backends handle requests with different processing times
- **Dynamic Load Optimization**: Automatic routing to least busy servers
- **Mixed Workloads**: Combination of fast and slow requests in your application
- **High Concurrent Load**: Handle **8,847 RPS** with intelligent routing
- **Auto Load Balancing**: Let the system automatically optimize traffic distribution

#### Use Weighted Round Robin When:
- **Different Backend Capacities**: Servers with varying CPU, memory, or processing power
- **Gradual Traffic Migration**: Moving traffic between old and new infrastructure
- **Cost Optimization**: Route more traffic to powerful/expensive servers
- **Capacity-Aware Routing**: Achieve **7,891 RPS** respecting server capabilities
- **Precise Traffic Control**: Want exact control over traffic ratios (5:2:1 example)

### Extreme Load Resilience

Helios demonstrates exceptional resilience under extreme load conditions:

#### 2000 Concurrent Connections Test (Real Edge Case Performance)
- **Throughput**: 5,371 RPS sustained under extreme load (100% success rate)
- **Total Requests**: 322,797 successful requests processed in 60 seconds
- **System Stability**: No complete system failure even at maximum stress
- **Data Transfer**: 50.18MB successfully transferred under brutal load
- **Latency Resilience**: Maintained 364ms median latency under extreme conditions
- **Enterprise Readiness**: Proves capability to handle Black Friday-level traffic spikes

#### Performance Summary (Real Benchmarks - 100% Success Rate):
- **Best for Maximum Throughput**: IP Hash (10,092 RPS)
- **Best for Intelligent Routing**: Least Connections (8,847 RPS)
- **Best for Equal Distribution**: Round Robin (8,234 RPS)
- **Best for Capacity Awareness**: Weighted Round Robin (7,891 RPS)
- **Best for Extreme Load**: All strategies survive 2000+ concurrent connections with zero failures

## Architecture

```mermaid
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13 changes: 13 additions & 0 deletions helm/helios/Chart.yaml
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@@ -0,0 +1,13 @@
apiVersion: v2
name: helios
description: "Helios L7 reverse proxy and load balancer"
type: application
version: 0.1.0
appVersion: "0.1.0"
keywords:
- reverse-proxy
- load-balancer
- helios
maintainers:
- name: Allen Elzayn
email: "[email protected]"
18 changes: 18 additions & 0 deletions helm/helios/templates/_helpers.tpl
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{{- define "helios.name" -}}
{{- default .Chart.Name .Values.nameOverride -}}
{{- end -}}

{{- define "helios.fullname" -}}
{{- if .Values.fullnameOverride }}
{{- .Values.fullnameOverride -}}
{{- else }}
{{- printf "%s-%s" .Release.Name (include "helios.name" .) | trunc 63 | trimSuffix "-" -}}
{{- end }}
{{- end -}}

{{- define "helios.labels" -}}
app.kubernetes.io/name: {{ include "helios.name" . }}
app.kubernetes.io/instance: {{ .Release.Name }}
app.kubernetes.io/version: {{ .Chart.AppVersion | default .Chart.Version }}
app.kubernetes.io/managed-by: Helm
{{- end -}}
12 changes: 12 additions & 0 deletions helm/helios/templates/configmap.yaml
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apiVersion: v1
kind: ConfigMap
metadata:
name: {{ include "helios.fullname" . }}-config
labels:
{{- include "helios.labels" . | nindent 4 }}
data:
helios.yaml: |
server:
port: {{ .Values.service.port }}
tls:
enabled: {{ .Values.tls.enabled }}
79 changes: 79 additions & 0 deletions helm/helios/templates/deployment.yaml
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apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
name: {{ include "helios.fullname" . }}
labels:
{{- include "helios.labels" . | nindent 4 }}
spec:
replicas: {{ .Values.replicaCount }}
selector:
matchLabels:
app.kubernetes.io/name: {{ include "helios.name" . }}
app.kubernetes.io/instance: {{ .Release.Name }}
template:
metadata:
labels:
{{- include "helios.labels" . | nindent 8 }}
annotations:
{{- toYaml .Values.podAnnotations | nindent 8 }}
spec:
{{- if .Values.imagePullSecrets }}
imagePullSecrets:
{{- toYaml .Values.imagePullSecrets | nindent 8 }}
{{- end }}
nodeSelector:
{{- toYaml .Values.nodeSelector | nindent 8 }}
tolerations:
{{- toYaml .Values.tolerations | nindent 8 }}
affinity:
{{- toYaml .Values.affinity | nindent 8 }}
containers:
- name: helios
image: "{{ .Values.image.repository }}:{{ .Values.image.tag }}"
imagePullPolicy: {{ .Values.image.pullPolicy }}
command: ["/helios"]
args: {{ toYaml .Values.extraArgs | default (list) | nindent 12 }}
ports:
- name: http
containerPort: {{ .Values.service.port }}
{{- if .Values.metrics.enabled }}
- name: metrics
containerPort: {{ .Values.metrics.port }}
{{- end }}
{{- if .Values.adminAPI.enabled }}
- name: admin
containerPort: {{ .Values.adminAPI.port }}
{{- end }}
env:
{{- range $idx, $env := .Values.extraEnv }}
- name: {{ $env.name }}
value: {{ $env.value | quote }}
{{- end }}
volumeMounts:
- name: config
mountPath: /etc/helios
readOnly: true
resources:
{{- toYaml .Values.resources | nindent 12 }}
livenessProbe:
httpGet:
path: /health
port: {{ .Values.metrics.port }}
initialDelaySeconds: 10
periodSeconds: 15
timeoutSeconds: 5
successThreshold: 1
failureThreshold: 3
readinessProbe:
httpGet:
path: /health
port: {{ .Values.metrics.port }}
initialDelaySeconds: 5
periodSeconds: 10
timeoutSeconds: 3
successThreshold: 1
failureThreshold: 3
volumes:
- name: config
configMap:
name: {{ include "helios.fullname" . }}-config
22 changes: 22 additions & 0 deletions helm/helios/templates/hpa.yaml
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@@ -0,0 +1,22 @@
{{- if .Values.autoscaling.enabled }}
apiVersion: autoscaling/v2
kind: HorizontalPodAutoscaler
metadata:
name: {{ include "helios.fullname" . }}
labels:
{{- include "helios.labels" . | nindent 4 }}
spec:
scaleTargetRef:
apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
name: {{ include "helios.fullname" . }}
minReplicas: {{ .Values.autoscaling.minReplicas }}
maxReplicas: {{ .Values.autoscaling.maxReplicas }}
metrics:
- type: Resource
resource:
name: cpu
target:
type: Utilization
averageUtilization: {{ .Values.autoscaling.targetCPUUtilizationPercentage }}
{{- end }}
27 changes: 27 additions & 0 deletions helm/helios/templates/ingress.yaml
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{{- if .Values.ingress.enabled }}
apiVersion: networking.k8s.io/v1
kind: Ingress
metadata:
name: {{ include "helios.fullname" . }}
annotations:
{{- range $key, $value := .Values.ingress.annotations }}
{{ $key }}: {{ $value | quote }}
{{- end }}
spec:
ingressClassName: {{ .Values.ingress.className }}
rules:
{{- range .Values.ingress.hosts }}
- host: {{ .host | quote }}
http:
paths:
{{- range .paths }}
- path: {{ .path | quote }}
pathType: {{ .pathType }}
backend:
service:
name: {{ include "helios.fullname" $ }}
port:
number: {{ $.Values.service.port }}
{{- end }}
{{- end }}
{{- end }}
25 changes: 25 additions & 0 deletions helm/helios/templates/service.yaml
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
@@ -0,0 +1,25 @@
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
name: {{ include "helios.fullname" . }}
labels:
{{- include "helios.labels" . | nindent 4 }}
spec:
type: {{ .Values.service.type }}
selector:
app.kubernetes.io/name: {{ include "helios.name" . }}
app.kubernetes.io/instance: {{ .Release.Name }}
ports:
- name: http
port: {{ .Values.service.port }}
targetPort: {{ .Values.service.targetPort }}
{{- if .Values.metrics.enabled }}
- name: metrics
port: {{ .Values.metrics.port }}
targetPort: {{ .Values.metrics.port }}
{{- end }}
{{- if .Values.adminAPI.enabled }}
- name: admin
port: {{ .Values.adminAPI.port }}
targetPort: {{ .Values.adminAPI.port }}
{{- end }}
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