[[!comment format=mdwn
 username="joey"
 subject="""comment 3"""
 date="2015-08-04T16:07:23Z"
 content="""
I don't know how you used ts to get that output, but it does not appear to
be accurate. Here's `git annex get | ts "%b %d %H:%M:%.s"`:

	Aug 04 12:10:1438704612.238164 get bob (from origin...) 
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704612.238336 SHA256E-s30--7c3722f359d8cfbc594e5dec6d7f096bf4e88adbfb786548a607708d32ef49bb
	             30 100%   29.30kB/s    0:00:00 (xfr#1, to-chk=0/1)
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704612.597912 ok
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704612.642574 get bob2 (from origin...) 
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704612.642653 SHA256E-s30--22fdcad0fba3537a7a0bc2b824f805fdd2d2c032b6450352cb8d099d03c8d796
	             30 100%   29.30kB/s    0:00:00 (xfr#1, to-chk=0/1)
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704613.001088 ok
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704613.043018 get bob3 (from origin...) 
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704613.043105 SHA256E-s30--9f0e99611fe904e173fb1c81d57ba9f01a111afdf222a7763844c7b893af86ff
	             30 100%   29.30kB/s    0:00:00 (xfr#1, to-chk=0/1)
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704613.393817 ok
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704613.421080 get bob5 (from origin...) 
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704613.421198 SHA256E-s30--7b851aa7791136f783271c109c287614bf2c0e9014d0fab50b1bf32f4ad4678e
	             30 100%   29.30kB/s    0:00:00 (xfr#1, to-chk=0/1)
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704613.769410 ok
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704613.800044 get bob6 (from origin...) 
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704613.800133 SHA256E-s33--a165803131075f75132f632a6f295b12910f84a5d1776b60d1d998b96a6f20d5
	             33 100%   32.23kB/s    0:00:00 (xfr#1, to-chk=0/1)
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704614.148597 ok
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704614.200786 get bob7 (from origin...) 
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704614.200881 SHA256E-s30--8b5b0b239b465a407ca98c8dc82a0081ee5ced4f7402854dc9afac75b65b5b51
	             30 100%   29.30kB/s    0:00:00 (xfr#1, to-chk=0/1)
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704614.560315 ok
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704614.602174 get bob8 (from origin...) 
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704614.602255 SHA256E-s30--70657536d54051bd020f984f866b017d5919b7705bf08ffa2786c0dd14f90280
	             30 100%   29.30kB/s    0:00:00 (xfr#1, to-chk=0/1)
	Aug 04 12:10:1438704614.961264 ok

Note that this shows up to 3 files sent per second. The output you pasted shows not 1 file/s, but 2 or almost 3.

There are no 1s (or other) sleeps. This is quite likely simply the overhead of
git-annex needing to query git to work out what remote each file is located on,
coupled with the overhead of needing to start a new git-annex-shell and rsync
processes.

Using -J4 or so will speed this up quite a lot.

Without -J4:

	0.22user 0.09system 0:04.84elapsed 6%CPU (0avgtext+0avgdata 33644maxresident)k
	0inputs+832outputs (0major+16191minor)pagefaults 0swaps

With -J4:

	0.34user 0.06system 0:01.35elapsed 30%CPU (0avgtext+0avgdata 35996maxresident)k
	0inputs+752outputs (0major+17451minor)pagefaults 0swaps
"""]]