xref: /linux/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-trace.txt (revision e7e86d7697c6ed1dbbde18d7185c35b6967945ed)
1perf-trace(1)
2=============
3
4NAME
5----
6perf-trace - strace inspired tool
7
8SYNOPSIS
9--------
10[verse]
11'perf trace'
12'perf trace record'
13
14DESCRIPTION
15-----------
16This command will show the events associated with the target, initially
17syscalls, but other system events like pagefaults, task lifetime events,
18scheduling events, etc.
19
20This is a live mode tool in addition to working with perf.data files like
21the other perf tools. Files can be generated using the 'perf record' command
22but the session needs to include the raw_syscalls events (-e 'raw_syscalls:*').
23Alternatively, 'perf trace record' can be used as a shortcut to
24automatically include the raw_syscalls events when writing events to a file.
25
26The following options apply to perf trace; options to perf trace record are
27found in the perf record man page.
28
29OPTIONS
30-------
31
32-a::
33--all-cpus::
34        System-wide collection from all CPUs.
35
36-e::
37--expr::
38--event::
39	List of syscalls and other perf events (tracepoints, HW cache events,
40	etc) to show. Globbing is supported, e.g.: "epoll_*", "*msg*", etc.
41	See 'perf list' for a complete list of events.
42	Prefixing with ! shows all syscalls but the ones specified.  You may
43	need to escape it.
44
45--filter=<filter>::
46        Event filter. This option should follow an event selector (-e) which
47	selects tracepoint event(s).
48
49
50-D msecs::
51--delay msecs::
52After starting the program, wait msecs before measuring. This is useful to
53filter out the startup phase of the program, which is often very different.
54
55-o::
56--output=::
57	Output file name.
58
59-p::
60--pid=::
61	Record events on existing process ID (comma separated list).
62
63-t::
64--tid=::
65        Record events on existing thread ID (comma separated list).
66
67-u::
68--uid=::
69        Record events in threads owned by uid. Name or number.
70
71-G::
72--cgroup::
73	Record events in threads in a cgroup.
74
75	Look for cgroups to set at the /sys/fs/cgroup/perf_event directory, then
76	remove the /sys/fs/cgroup/perf_event/ part and try:
77
78		perf trace -G A -e sched:*switch
79
80	Will set all raw_syscalls:sys_{enter,exit}, pgfault, vfs_getname, etc
81	_and_ sched:sched_switch to the 'A' cgroup, while:
82
83		perf trace -e sched:*switch -G A
84
85	will only set the sched:sched_switch event to the 'A' cgroup, all the
86	other events (raw_syscalls:sys_{enter,exit}, etc are left "without"
87	a cgroup (on the root cgroup, sys wide, etc).
88
89	Multiple cgroups:
90
91		perf trace -G A -e sched:*switch -G B
92
93	the syscall ones go to the 'A' cgroup, the sched:sched_switch goes
94	to the 'B' cgroup.
95
96--filter-pids=::
97	Filter out events for these pids and for 'trace' itself (comma separated list).
98
99-v::
100--verbose::
101        Increase the verbosity level.
102
103--no-inherit::
104	Child tasks do not inherit counters.
105
106-m::
107--mmap-pages=::
108	Number of mmap data pages (must be a power of two) or size
109	specification in bytes with appended unit character - B/K/M/G.
110	The size is rounded up to the nearest power-of-two page value.
111
112-C::
113--cpu::
114Collect samples only on the list of CPUs provided. Multiple CPUs can be provided as a
115comma-separated list with no space: 0,1. Ranges of CPUs are specified with -: 0-2.
116In per-thread mode with inheritance mode on (default), Events are captured only when
117the thread executes on the designated CPUs. Default is to monitor all CPUs.
118
119--duration::
120	Show only events that had a duration greater than N.M ms.
121
122--sched::
123	Accrue thread runtime and provide a summary at the end of the session.
124
125--failure::
126	Show only syscalls that failed, i.e. that returned < 0.
127
128-i::
129--input::
130	Process events from a given perf data file.
131
132-T::
133--time::
134	Print full timestamp rather time relative to first sample.
135
136--comm::
137        Show process COMM right beside its ID, on by default, disable with --no-comm.
138
139-s::
140--summary::
141	Show only a summary of syscalls by thread with min, max, and average times
142    (in msec) and relative stddev.
143
144-S::
145--with-summary::
146	Show all syscalls followed by a summary by thread with min, max, and
147    average times (in msec) and relative stddev.
148
149--errno-summary::
150	To be used with -s or -S, to show stats for the errnos experienced by
151	syscalls, using only this option will trigger --summary.
152
153--summary-mode=mode::
154	To be used with -s or -S, to select how to show summary.  By default it'll
155	show the syscall summary by thread.  Possible values are: thread, total,
156	cgroup.
157
158--tool_stats::
159	Show tool stats such as number of times fd->pathname was discovered thru
160	hooking the open syscall return + vfs_getname or via reading /proc/pid/fd, etc.
161
162-f::
163--force::
164	Don't complain, do it.
165
166-F=[all|min|maj]::
167--pf=[all|min|maj]::
168	Trace pagefaults. Optionally, you can specify whether you want minor,
169	major or all pagefaults. Default value is maj.
170
171--syscalls::
172	Trace system calls. This options is enabled by default, disable with
173	--no-syscalls.
174
175--call-graph [mode,type,min[,limit],order[,key][,branch]]::
176        Setup and enable call-graph (stack chain/backtrace) recording.
177        See `--call-graph` section in perf-record and perf-report
178        man pages for details. The ones that are most useful in 'perf trace'
179        are 'dwarf' and 'lbr', where available, try: 'perf trace --call-graph dwarf'.
180
181        Using this will, for the root user, bump the value of --mmap-pages to 4
182        times the maximum for non-root users, based on the kernel.perf_event_mlock_kb
183        sysctl. This is done only if the user doesn't specify a --mmap-pages value.
184
185--kernel-syscall-graph::
186	 Show the kernel callchains on the syscall exit path.
187
188--max-events=N::
189	Stop after processing N events. Note that strace-like events are considered
190	only at exit time or when a syscall is interrupted, i.e. in those cases this
191	option is equivalent to the number of lines printed.
192
193--switch-on EVENT_NAME::
194	Only consider events after this event is found.
195
196--switch-off EVENT_NAME::
197	Stop considering events after this event is found.
198
199--show-on-off-events::
200	Show the --switch-on/off events too.
201
202--max-stack::
203        Set the stack depth limit when parsing the callchain, anything
204        beyond the specified depth will be ignored. Note that at this point
205        this is just about the presentation part, i.e. the kernel is still
206        not limiting, the overhead of callchains needs to be set via the
207        knobs in --call-graph dwarf.
208
209        Implies '--call-graph dwarf' when --call-graph not present on the
210        command line, on systems where DWARF unwinding was built in.
211
212        Default: /proc/sys/kernel/perf_event_max_stack when present for
213                 live sessions (without --input/-i), 127 otherwise.
214
215--min-stack::
216        Set the stack depth limit when parsing the callchain, anything
217        below the specified depth will be ignored. Disabled by default.
218
219        Implies '--call-graph dwarf' when --call-graph not present on the
220        command line, on systems where DWARF unwinding was built in.
221
222--print-sample::
223	Print the PERF_RECORD_SAMPLE PERF_SAMPLE_ info for the
224	raw_syscalls:sys_{enter,exit} tracepoints, for debugging.
225
226--proc-map-timeout::
227	When processing pre-existing threads /proc/XXX/mmap, it may take a long time,
228	because the file may be huge. A time out is needed in such cases.
229	This option sets the time out limit. The default value is 500 ms.
230
231--sort-events::
232	Do sorting on batches of events, use when noticing out of order events that
233	may happen, for instance, when a thread gets migrated to a different CPU
234	while processing a syscall.
235
236--libtraceevent_print::
237	Use libtraceevent to print tracepoint arguments. By default 'perf trace' uses
238	the same beautifiers used in the strace-like enter+exit lines to augment the
239	tracepoint arguments.
240
241--force-btf::
242	Use btf_dump to pretty print syscall argument data, instead of using hand-crafted pretty
243	printers. This option is intended for testing BTF integration in perf trace. btf_dump-based
244	pretty-printing serves as a fallback to hand-crafted pretty printers, as the latter can
245	better pretty-print integer flags and struct pointers.
246
247--bpf-summary::
248	Collect system call statistics in BPF.  This is only for live mode and
249	works well with -s/--summary option where no argument information is
250	required.
251
252--max-summary=N::
253	Maximum number of lines in the summary mode.  Note that this applies to
254	each entry (thread or cgroup).
255
256
257PAGEFAULTS
258----------
259
260When tracing pagefaults, the format of the trace is as follows:
261
262<min|maj>fault [<ip.symbol>+<ip.offset>] => <addr.dso@addr.offset> (<map type><addr level>).
263
264- min/maj indicates whether fault event is minor or major;
265- ip.symbol shows symbol for instruction pointer (the code that generated the
266  fault); if no debug symbols available, perf trace will print raw IP;
267- addr.dso shows DSO for the faulted address;
268- map type is either 'd' for non-executable maps or 'x' for executable maps;
269- addr level is either 'k' for kernel dso or '.' for user dso.
270
271For symbols resolution you may need to install debugging symbols.
272
273Please be aware that duration is currently always 0 and doesn't reflect actual
274time it took for fault to be handled!
275
276When --verbose specified, perf trace tries to print all available information
277for both IP and fault address in the form of dso@symbol+offset.
278
279EXAMPLES
280--------
281
282Trace only major pagefaults:
283
284 $ perf trace --no-syscalls -F
285
286Trace syscalls, major and minor pagefaults:
287
288 $ perf trace -F all
289
290  1416.547 ( 0.000 ms): python/20235 majfault [CRYPTO_push_info_+0x0] => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libcrypto.so.1.0.0@0x61be0 (x.)
291
292  As you can see, there was major pagefault in python process, from
293  CRYPTO_push_info_ routine which faulted somewhere in libcrypto.so.
294
295Trace the first 4 open, openat or open_by_handle_at syscalls (in the future more syscalls may match here):
296
297  $ perf trace -e open* --max-events 4
298  [root@jouet perf]# trace -e open* --max-events 4
299  2272.992 ( 0.037 ms): gnome-shell/1370 openat(dfd: CWD, filename: /proc/self/stat) = 31
300  2277.481 ( 0.139 ms): gnome-shell/3039 openat(dfd: CWD, filename: /proc/self/stat) = 65
301  3026.398 ( 0.076 ms): gnome-shell/3039 openat(dfd: CWD, filename: /proc/self/stat) = 65
302  4294.665 ( 0.015 ms): sed/15879 openat(dfd: CWD, filename: /etc/ld.so.cache, flags: CLOEXEC) = 3
303  $
304
305Trace the first minor page fault when running a workload:
306
307  # perf trace -F min --max-stack=7 --max-events 1 sleep 1
308     0.000 ( 0.000 ms): sleep/18006 minfault [__clear_user+0x1a] => 0x5626efa56080 (?k)
309                                       __clear_user ([kernel.kallsyms])
310                                       load_elf_binary ([kernel.kallsyms])
311                                       search_binary_handler ([kernel.kallsyms])
312                                       __do_execve_file.isra.33 ([kernel.kallsyms])
313                                       __x64_sys_execve ([kernel.kallsyms])
314                                       do_syscall_64 ([kernel.kallsyms])
315                                       entry_SYSCALL_64 ([kernel.kallsyms])
316  #
317
318Trace the next min page page fault to take place on the first CPU:
319
320  # perf trace -F min --call-graph=dwarf --max-events 1 --cpu 0
321     0.000 ( 0.000 ms): Web Content/17136 minfault [js::gc::Chunk::fetchNextDecommittedArena+0x4b] => 0x7fbe6181b000 (?.)
322                                       js::gc::FreeSpan::initAsEmpty (inlined)
323                                       js::gc::Arena::setAsNotAllocated (inlined)
324                                       js::gc::Chunk::fetchNextDecommittedArena (/usr/lib64/firefox/libxul.so)
325                                       js::gc::Chunk::allocateArena (/usr/lib64/firefox/libxul.so)
326                                       js::gc::GCRuntime::allocateArena (/usr/lib64/firefox/libxul.so)
327                                       js::gc::ArenaLists::allocateFromArena (/usr/lib64/firefox/libxul.so)
328                                       js::gc::GCRuntime::tryNewTenuredThing<JSString, (js::AllowGC)1> (inlined)
329                                       js::AllocateString<JSString, (js::AllowGC)1> (/usr/lib64/firefox/libxul.so)
330                                       js::Allocate<JSThinInlineString, (js::AllowGC)1> (inlined)
331                                       JSThinInlineString::new_<(js::AllowGC)1> (inlined)
332                                       AllocateInlineString<(js::AllowGC)1, unsigned char> (inlined)
333                                       js::ConcatStrings<(js::AllowGC)1> (/usr/lib64/firefox/libxul.so)
334                                       [0x18b26e6bc2bd] (/tmp/perf-17136.map)
335  #
336
337Trace the next two sched:sched_switch events, four block:*_plug events, the
338next block:*_unplug and the next three net:*dev_queue events, this last one
339with a backtrace of at most 16 entries, system wide:
340
341  # perf trace -e sched:*switch/nr=2/,block:*_plug/nr=4/,block:*_unplug/nr=1/,net:*dev_queue/nr=3,max-stack=16/
342     0.000 :0/0 sched:sched_switch:swapper/2:0 [120] S ==> rcu_sched:10 [120]
343     0.015 rcu_sched/10 sched:sched_switch:rcu_sched:10 [120] R ==> swapper/2:0 [120]
344   254.198 irq/50-iwlwifi/680 net:net_dev_queue:dev=wlp3s0 skbaddr=0xffff93498051f600 len=66
345                                       __dev_queue_xmit ([kernel.kallsyms])
346   273.977 :0/0 net:net_dev_queue:dev=wlp3s0 skbaddr=0xffff93498051f600 len=78
347                                       __dev_queue_xmit ([kernel.kallsyms])
348   274.007 :0/0 net:net_dev_queue:dev=wlp3s0 skbaddr=0xffff93498051ff00 len=78
349                                       __dev_queue_xmit ([kernel.kallsyms])
350  2930.140 kworker/u16:58/2722 block:block_plug:[kworker/u16:58]
351  2930.162 kworker/u16:58/2722 block:block_unplug:[kworker/u16:58] 1
352  4466.094 jbd2/dm-2-8/748 block:block_plug:[jbd2/dm-2-8]
353  8050.123 kworker/u16:30/2694 block:block_plug:[kworker/u16:30]
354  8050.271 kworker/u16:30/2694 block:block_plug:[kworker/u16:30]
355  #
356
357SEE ALSO
358--------
359linkperf:perf-record[1], linkperf:perf-script[1]
360