Yocto Project Profiling and Tracing Manual

The Yocto Project

Copyright © 2010-2020, The Linux Foundation

<docs@lists.yoctoproject.org>

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Note

• This version of this manual is for the 3.1 release of the Yocto Project. To be sure you have the latest version of the manual for this release, go to the Yocto Project documentation page and select the manual from that site. Manuals from the site are more up-to-date than manuals derived from the Yocto Project released TAR files.

• If you located this manual through a web search, the version of the manual might not be the one you want (e.g. the search might have returned a manual much older than the Yocto Project version with which you are working). You can see all Yocto Project major releases by visiting the Releases page. If you need a version of this manual for a different Yocto Project release, visit the Yocto Project documentation page and select the manual set by using the “ACTIVE RELEASES DOCUMENTATION” or “DOCUMENTS ARCHIVE” pull-down menus.

• To report any inaccuracies or problems with this (or any other Yocto Project) manual, send an email to the Yocto Project documentation mailing list at docs@lists.yoctoproject.org or log into the freenode #yocto channel.

Revision	Date	Note
1.4	April 2013	The initial document released with the Yocto Project 1.4 Release
1.5	October 2013	Released with the Yocto Project 1.5 Release.
1.6	April 2014	Released with the Yocto Project 1.6 Release.
1.7	October 2014	Released with the Yocto Project 1.7 Release.
1.8	April 2015	Released with the Yocto Project 1.8 Release.
2.0	October 2015	Released with the Yocto Project 2.0 Release.
2.1	April 2016	Released with the Yocto Project 2.1 Release.
2.2	October 2016	Released with the Yocto Project 2.2 Release.
2.3	May 2017	Released with the Yocto Project 2.3 Release.
2.4	October 2017	Released with the Yocto Project 2.4 Release.
2.5	May 2018	Released with the Yocto Project 2.5 Release.
2.6	November 2018	Released with the Yocto Project 2.6 Release.
2.7	May 2019	Released with the Yocto Project 2.7 Release.
3.0	October 2019	Released with the Yocto Project 3.0 Release.
3.1	April 2020	Released with the Yocto Project 3.1 Release.

Table of Contents

• 1. Yocto Project Profiling and Tracing Manual
  • 1.1. Introduction
  • 1.2. General Setup
• 2. Overall Architecture of the Linux Tracing and Profiling Tools
  • 2.1. Architecture of the Tracing and Profiling Tools
• 3. Basic Usage (with examples) for each of the Yocto Tracing Tools
  • 3.1. perf
    • 3.1.1. Setup
    • 3.1.2. Basic Usage
      • 3.1.2.1. Using perf to do Basic Profiling
      • 3.1.2.2. Using perf to do Basic Tracing
      • 3.1.2.3. System-Wide Tracing and Profiling
        • 3.1.2.3.1. Filtering
      • 3.1.2.4. Using Dynamic Tracepoints
    • 3.1.3. Documentation
  • 3.2. ftrace
    • 3.2.1. Setup
    • 3.2.2. Basic ftrace usage
    • 3.2.3. The ‘trace events’ Subsystem
    • 3.2.4. trace-cmd/kernelshark
    • 3.2.5. Documentation
  • 3.3. systemtap
    • 3.3.1. Setup
    • 3.3.2. Running a Script on a Target
    • 3.3.3. Documentation
  • 3.4. Sysprof
    • 3.4.1. Setup
    • 3.4.2. Basic Usage
    • 3.4.3. Documentation
  • 3.5. LTTng (Linux Trace Toolkit, next generation)
    • 3.5.1. Setup
    • 3.5.2. Collecting and Viewing Traces
      • 3.5.2.1. Collecting and viewing a trace on the target (inside a shell)
      • 3.5.2.2. Collecting and viewing a userspace trace on the target (inside a shell)
    • 3.5.3. Documentation
  • 3.6. blktrace
    • 3.6.1. Setup
    • 3.6.2. Basic Usage
      • 3.6.2.1. Live Mode
      • 3.6.2.2. Using blktrace Remotely
      • 3.6.2.3. Tracing Block I/O via ‘ftrace’
    • 3.6.3. Documentation
• 4. Real-World Examples
  • 4.1. Slow Write Speed on Live Images