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https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/MAPREDUCE-2094?page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:all-tabpanel
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Niels Basjes updated MAPREDUCE-2094:
------------------------------------

    Description: 
When implementing a custom derivative of FileInputFormat we ran into the effect 
that a large Gzipped input file would be processed several times. 

A near 1GiB file would be processed around 36 times in its entirety. Thus 
producing garbage results and taking up a lot more CPU time than needed.

It took a while to figure out and what we found is that the default 
implementation of the isSplittable method in 
[org.apache.hadoop.mapreduce.lib.input.FileInputFormat | 
http://svn.apache.org/viewvc/hadoop/mapreduce/trunk/src/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapreduce/lib/input/FileInputFormat.java?view=markup
 ] is simply "return true;". 

This is a very unsafe default and is in contradiction with the JavaDoc of the 
method which states: "Is the given filename splitable? Usually, true, but if 
the file is stream compressed, it will not be. " . The actual implementation 
effectively does "Is the given filename splitable? Always true, even if the 
file is stream compressed using an unsplittable compression codec. "

For our situation (where we always have Gzipped input) we took the easy way out 
and simply implemented an isSplittable in our class that does "return false; "

Now there are essentially 3 ways I can think of for fixing this (in order of 
what I would find preferable):
# Implement something that looks at the used compression of the file (i.e. do 
migrate the implementation from TextInputFormat to FileInputFormat). This would 
make the method do what the JavaDoc describes.
# "Force" developers to think about it and make this method abstract.
# Use a "safe" default (i.e. return false)

  was:
When implementing a custom derivative of FileInputFormat we ran into the effect 
that a large Gzipped input file would be processed several times. A near 1GiB 
file would be processed around 36 times in its entirety. Thus producing garbage 
results and taking up a lot more CPU time than needed.

It took a while to figure out and what we found is that the default 
implementation of the isSplittable method in 
[org.apache.hadoop.mapreduce.lib.input.FileInputFormat | 
http://svn.apache.org/viewvc/hadoop/mapreduce/trunk/src/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapreduce/lib/input/FileInputFormat.java?view=markup
 ] is simply "return true;". This is a very unsafe default and is in 
contradcition with the JavaDoc of the method which states: "Is the given 
filename splitable? Usually, true, but if the file is stream compressed, it 
will not be. " 

For our situation (where we always have Gzipped input) we took the easy way out 
and simply implemented an isSplittable inour class that does "return false; "

Now there are essentially 3 ways I can think of for fixing this (in order of 
what I would find preferable):
# Implement something that looks at the used compression of the file (i.e. do 
migrate the implementation from TextInputFormat to FileInputFormat). This would 
make the method do what the JavaDoc describes.
# "Force" developers to think about it and make this method (and therfor the 
entire FileInputFormat class) abstract.
# Use a "safe" default (i.e. return false)


> org.apache.hadoop.mapreduce.lib.input.FileInputFormat: isSplitable implements 
> unsafe default behaviour that is different from the documented behaviour.
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>                 Key: MAPREDUCE-2094
>                 URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/MAPREDUCE-2094
>             Project: Hadoop Map/Reduce
>          Issue Type: Bug
>          Components: task
>    Affects Versions: 0.20.1, 0.20.2, 0.21.0
>            Reporter: Niels Basjes
>
> When implementing a custom derivative of FileInputFormat we ran into the 
> effect that a large Gzipped input file would be processed several times. 
> A near 1GiB file would be processed around 36 times in its entirety. Thus 
> producing garbage results and taking up a lot more CPU time than needed.
> It took a while to figure out and what we found is that the default 
> implementation of the isSplittable method in 
> [org.apache.hadoop.mapreduce.lib.input.FileInputFormat | 
> http://svn.apache.org/viewvc/hadoop/mapreduce/trunk/src/java/org/apache/hadoop/mapreduce/lib/input/FileInputFormat.java?view=markup
>  ] is simply "return true;". 
> This is a very unsafe default and is in contradiction with the JavaDoc of the 
> method which states: "Is the given filename splitable? Usually, true, but if 
> the file is stream compressed, it will not be. " . The actual implementation 
> effectively does "Is the given filename splitable? Always true, even if the 
> file is stream compressed using an unsplittable compression codec. "
> For our situation (where we always have Gzipped input) we took the easy way 
> out and simply implemented an isSplittable in our class that does "return 
> false; "
> Now there are essentially 3 ways I can think of for fixing this (in order of 
> what I would find preferable):
> # Implement something that looks at the used compression of the file (i.e. do 
> migrate the implementation from TextInputFormat to FileInputFormat). This 
> would make the method do what the JavaDoc describes.
> # "Force" developers to think about it and make this method abstract.
> # Use a "safe" default (i.e. return false)

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