xref: /freebsd/share/man/man9/get_cyclecount.9 (revision d93a896ef95946b0bf1219866fcb324b78543444)
1.\" Copyright (c) 2000 Mark R V Murray
2.\" All rights reserved.
3.\"
4.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
5.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
6.\" are met:
7.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
8.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
9.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
10.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
11.\"    documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
12.\"
13.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE AUTHOR AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
14.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
15.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
16.\" ARE DISCLAIMED.  IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
17.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
18.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS
19.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
20.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT
21.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY
22.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
23.\" SUCH DAMAGE.
24.\"
25.\" $FreeBSD$
26.\"
27.Dd March 15, 2011
28.Dt GET_CYCLECOUNT 9
29.Os
30.Sh NAME
31.Nm get_cyclecount
32.Nd get the CPU's fast counter register contents
33.Sh SYNOPSIS
34.In sys/param.h
35.In sys/systm.h
36.In machine/cpu.h
37.Ft uint64_t
38.Fn get_cyclecount "void"
39.Sh DESCRIPTION
40The
41.Fn get_cyclecount
42function uses a register
43available in most modern CPUs
44to return a value
45that is monotonically increasing
46inside each CPU.
47.Pp
48On SMP systems,
49there will be a number of
50separate monotonic sequences,
51one for each CPU running.
52The value in the SMP case is
53selected from one of these sequences,
54dependent on which CPU
55was scheduled to service the request.
56.Pp
57The speed and the maximum value
58of each counter
59is CPU-dependent.
60Some CPUs
61(such as the
62.Tn Intel
6380486)
64do not have such a register,
65so
66.Fn get_cyclecount
67on these platforms
68returns a (monotonic) combination of numbers
69represented by the
70structure returned by
71.Xr binuptime 9 .
72.Pp
73The
74.Tn AMD64
75and
76.Tn Intel 64
77processors use the
78.Li TSC
79register.
80.Sh SEE ALSO
81.Xr binuptime 9
82.Sh HISTORY
83The
84.Fn get_cyclecount
85function first appeared in
86.Fx 5.0 .
87.Sh AUTHORS
88This manual page was written by
89.An Mark Murray Aq Mt markm@FreeBSD.org .
90