Message-Id: <20080711153740.b86acadd.akpm@linux-foundation.org>
Date:	Fri, 11 Jul 2008 15:37:40 -0700
From:	Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>
To:	Steven Rostedt <rostedt@...dmis.org>
Cc:	Randy Dunlap <randy.dunlap@...cle.com>,
	Elias Oltmanns <eo@...ensachen.de>,
	LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>, Ingo Molnar <mingo@...e.hu>,
	Thomas Gleixner <tglx@...utronix.de>,
	Peter Zijlstra <peterz@...radead.org>,
	Clark Williams <clark.williams@...il.com>,
	Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>,
	Jon Masters <jonathan@...masters.org>,
	"Eric W. Biederman" <ebiederm@...ssion.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH -v2] ftrace: Documentation

On Fri, 11 Jul 2008 16:59:53 -0400 (EDT) Steven Rostedt <rostedt@...dmis.org> wrote:

> 
> > > +
> > > +  tracing_cpumask : This is a mask that lets the user only trace
> > > +		on specified CPUS. The format is a hex string
> > > +		representing the CPUS.
> >
> > Why is this feature useful?  (I'd have asked this prior to merging, if I'd
> > known it existed!)
> 
> I can't comment on this. I didn't write that code, I just added it to
> the document because I saw it existed. This was added by Ingo and Thomas,
> without much description to why. I think it allows you to limit which
> CPUS to perform the trace on.

Information such as "why this code exists" seems fairly important ;)
It's surprising how often people forget to mention it (in comments, and
changelogs).

> >
> > > +  preemptirqsoff - Similar to irqsoff and preemptoff, but traces and
> > > +		 records the largest time irqs and/or preemption is
> > > +		 disabled.
> >
> > s/time/time for which/
> >
> > This interface has a strange mix of wordsruntogether and
> > words_separated_by_underscores.  Oh well - another consequence of
> > post-facto changelogging.
> 
> I should make sched_switch to schedswitch and that way we have the files
> having underscores and the tracers without them. Or should I add
> underscores to all of them?

Adding underscores is better, but it might not be worth the churn now, dunno.

> > > +
> > > +Here's an example of the output format of the file "trace"
> > > +
> > > +                             --------
> > > +# tracer: ftrace
> > > +#
> > > +#           TASK-PID   CPU#    TIMESTAMP  FUNCTION
> > > +#              | |      |          |         |
> > > +            bash-4251  [01] 10152.583854: path_put <-path_walk
> > > +            bash-4251  [01] 10152.583855: dput <-path_put
> > > +            bash-4251  [01] 10152.583855: _atomic_dec_and_lock <-dput
> > > +                             --------
> >
> > pids are no longer unique system-wide, and any part of the kernel ABI which
> > exports them to userspace is, basically, broken.  Oh well.
> 
> What should be used instead?  Of course we're not using a kernel ABI, we
> are using an API (text based ;-) But more on that later.

Well that's an interesting question and it has come up before.  There
are times when the kernel wants to display a process identifier at
least in a printk.  Oopses are one prominent example.

Perhaps we do need a way of doing this in a post-pid-namespace-world. 
Presumably it would be of the form "pidns-identifier:pid", and just
plain old "pid" if no pid namespaces are in operation, for some
back-compatibility where possible.

Eric, any thoughts?

> > > +# tracer: irqsoff
> > > +#
> > > +irqsoff latency trace v1.1.5 on 2.6.26-rc8
> > > +--------------------------------------------------------------------
> > > + latency: 97 us, #3/3, CPU#0 | (M:preempt VP:0, KP:0, SP:0 HP:0 #P:2)
> > > +    -----------------
> > > +    | task: swapper-0 (uid:0 nice:0 policy:0 rt_prio:0)
> > > +    -----------------
> > > + => started at: apic_timer_interrupt
> > > + => ended at:   do_softirq
> > > +
> > > +#                _------=> CPU#
> > > +#               / _-----=> irqs-off
> > > +#              | / _----=> need-resched
> > > +#              || / _---=> hardirq/softirq
> > > +#              ||| / _--=> preempt-depth
> > > +#              |||| /
> > > +#              |||||     delay
> > > +#  cmd     pid ||||| time  |   caller
> > > +#     \   /    |||||   \   |   /
> > > +  <idle>-0     0d..1    0us+: trace_hardirqs_off_thunk (apic_timer_interrupt)
> > > +  <idle>-0     0d.s.   97us : __do_softirq (do_softirq)
> > > +  <idle>-0     0d.s1   98us : trace_hardirqs_on (do_softirq)
> >
> > The kernel prints all that stuff out of a debugfs file?
> >
> > What have we done? :(
> 
> This is very helpful on embedded systems.

Well...  why?  embedded platforms can run userspace programs too.  But
the ornate nature of this kernel->userspace interface has gone and made
implementation of userspace parsers hard.

> If you are suggesting that the kernel comes with its own user land app
> (in scripts/ ?) to handle all the new tracers, then maybe it would be
> OK.

This also comes up again and again.  Kernel programmers have no
convenient route for delivering userspace code to users, so they end up
putting userspace functionality into the kernel.

getdelays.c is a counter-example.  We've maintained that as new
taskstats capabilities have come along and as it turned out, this was
quite easy and people find geydelays.c to be quite useful.  Its name is
outdated though.

> 
> > > +first followed by the next task or task waking up. The format for both
> > > +of these is PID:KERNEL-PRIO:TASK-STATE. Remember that the KERNEL-PRIO
> > > +is the inverse of the actual priority with zero (0) being the highest
> > > +priority and the nice values starting at 100 (nice -20). Below is
> > > +a quick chart to map the kernel priority to user land priorities.
> > > +
> > > +  Kernel priority: 0 to 99    ==> user RT priority 99 to 0
> > > +  Kernel priority: 100 to 139 ==> user nice -20 to 19
> > > +  Kernel priority: 140        ==> idle task priority
> > > +
> > > +The task states are:
> > > +
> > > + R - running : wants to run, may not actually be running
> > > + S - sleep   : process is waiting to be woken up (handles signals)
> > > + D - deep sleep : process must be woken up (ignores signals)
> >
> > "uninterruptible sleep", please.  no need to invent new (and hence
> > unfamilar) terms!
> 
> This is my own ignorance.  I didn't know the best way to say it. Why do
> we use 'D' for "uninterruptible sleep"? I don't see a 'D' in there? But
> "deep sleep" is more obvious. OK, I'll shut up and change it to
> "uniterruptible sleep".
> 

Heh.  Maybe "D" does indeed refer to "deep sleep".  That's all before
my time.  But yes, "uninterruptible sleep" is the well-known term for
this state.

> 
> >
> > > + T - stopped : process suspended
> > > + t - traced  : process is being traced (with something like gdb)
> > > + Z - zombie  : process waiting to be cleaned up
> > > + X - unknown
> > > +
> > > +
> > > +ftrace_enabled
> > > +--------------
> > > +
> > > +The following tracers give different output depending on whether
> > > +or not the sysctl ftrace_enabled is set. To set ftrace_enabled,
> > > +one can either use the sysctl function or set it via the proc
> > > +file system interface.
> > > +
> > > +  sysctl kernel.ftrace_enabled=1
> > > +
> > > + or
> > > +
> > > +  echo 1 > /proc/sys/kernel/ftrace_enabled
> > > +
> > > +To disable ftrace_enabled simply replace the '1' with '0' in
> > > +the above commands.
> > > +
> > > +When ftrace_enabled is set the tracers will also record the functions
> > > +that are within the trace. The descriptions of the tracers
> > > +will also show an example with ftrace enabled.
> >
> > What are "the following tracers" here?
> 
> They are "irqsoff" "preemptoff" "preemptirqsoff" "wakeup" "sched_switch"
> etc. Oh, I should state that?

I think so.

> > > +    -----------------
> > > +    | task: bash-4269 (uid:0 nice:0 policy:0 rt_prio:0)
> > > +    -----------------
> > > + => started at: copy_page_range
> > > + => ended at:   copy_page_range
> > > +
> > > +#                _------=> CPU#
> > > +#               / _-----=> irqs-off
> > > +#              | / _----=> need-resched
> > > +#              || / _---=> hardirq/softirq
> > > +#              ||| / _--=> preempt-depth
> > > +#              |||| /
> > > +#              |||||     delay
> > > +#  cmd     pid ||||| time  |   caller
> > > +#     \   /    |||||   \   |   /
> > > +    bash-4269  1...1    0us+: _spin_lock (copy_page_range)
> > > +    bash-4269  1...1    7us : _spin_unlock (copy_page_range)
> > > +    bash-4269  1...2    7us : trace_preempt_on (copy_page_range)
> >
> > istr writing stuff which does this in 1999 ;)
> 
> Why didn't you add it to the kernel then? ;-)

It was too large, was of doubtful usefulness and used
opening-brace-goes-on-a-new-line coding style ;)

> 
> > > +the size of the internal trace buffers. The number listed
> > > +is the number of entries that can be recorded per CPU. To know
> > > +the full size, multiply the number of possible CPUS with the
> > > +number of entries.
> >
> > How do I know the number of possible CPUs?  Within an order of magnitude?
> > Is it in dmesg, perhaps?
> 
> Good question?  I used NR_CPUS, I would like to change this to be online
> CPUS but small steps first.  Is NR_CPUS exported somewhere?
> 

erk.  I guess it's in the sysfs topology stuff somewhere.  I use `grep
processor /proc/cpuinfo|wc -l' but this is perhaps not the best of
interfaces!


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