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* [PATCH v3 00/14] perf, x86: Haswell LBR call stack support
@ 2014-02-18  6:07 Yan, Zheng
  2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 01/14] perf, x86: Reduce lbr_sel_map size Yan, Zheng
                   ` (16 more replies)
  0 siblings, 17 replies; 40+ messages in thread
From: Yan, Zheng @ 2014-02-18  6:07 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: linux-kernel; +Cc: a.p.zijlstra, mingo, acme, eranian, andi, Yan, Zheng

For many profiling tasks we need the callgraph. For example we often
need to see the caller of a lock or the caller of a memcpy or other
library function to actually tune the program. Frame pointer unwinding
is efficient and works well. But frame pointers are off by default on
64bit code (and on modern 32bit gccs), so there are many binaries around
that do not use frame pointers. Profiling unchanged production code is
very useful in practice. On some CPUs frame pointer also has a high
cost. Dwarf2 unwinding also does not always work and is extremely slow
(upto 20% overhead).

Haswell has a new feature that utilizes the existing Last Branch Record
facility to record call chains. When the feature is enabled, function
call will be collected as normal, but as return instructions are
executed the last captured branch record is popped from the on-chip LBR
registers. The LBR call stack facility provides an alternative to get
callgraph. It has some limitations too, but should work in most cases
and is significantly faster than dwarf. Frame pointer unwinding is still
the best default, but LBR call stack is a good alternative when nothing
else works.

This patch series adds LBR call stack support. User can enabled/disable
this through an sysfs attribute file in the CPU PMU directory:
 echo 1 > /sys/bus/event_source/devices/cpu/lbr_callstack 

When profiling bc(1) on Fedora 19:
 echo 'scale=2000; 4*a(1)' > cmd; perf record -g fp bc -l < cmd

If this feature is enabled, perf report output looks like:
    50.36%       bc  bc                 [.] bc_divide
                 |
                 --- bc_divide
                     execute
                     run_code
                     yyparse
                     main
                     __libc_start_main
                     _start

    33.66%       bc  bc                 [.] _one_mult
                 |
                 --- _one_mult
                     bc_divide
                     execute
                     run_code
                     yyparse
                     main
                     __libc_start_main
                     _start

     7.62%       bc  bc                 [.] _bc_do_add
                 |
                 --- _bc_do_add
                    |
                    |--99.89%-- 0x2000186a8
                     --0.11%-- [...]

     6.83%       bc  bc                 [.] _bc_do_sub
                 |
                 --- _bc_do_sub
                    |
                    |--99.94%-- bc_add
                    |          execute
                    |          run_code
                    |          yyparse
                    |          main
                    |          __libc_start_main
                    |          _start
                     --0.06%-- [...]

     0.46%       bc  libc-2.17.so       [.] __memset_sse2
                 |
                 --- __memset_sse2
                    |
                    |--54.13%-- bc_new_num
                    |          |
                    |          |--51.00%-- bc_divide
                    |          |          execute
                    |          |          run_code
                    |          |          yyparse
                    |          |          main
                    |          |          __libc_start_main
                    |          |          _start
                    |          |
                    |          |--30.46%-- _bc_do_sub
                    |          |          bc_add
                    |          |          execute
                    |          |          run_code
                    |          |          yyparse
                    |          |          main
                    |          |          __libc_start_main
                    |          |          _start
                    |          |
                    |           --18.55%-- _bc_do_add
                    |                     bc_add
                    |                     execute
                    |                     run_code
                    |                     yyparse
                    |                     main
                    |                     __libc_start_main
                    |                     _start
                    |
                     --45.87%-- bc_divide
                               execute
                               run_code
                               yyparse
                               main
                               __libc_start_main
                               _start

If this feature is disabled, perf report output looks like:
    50.49%       bc  bc                 [.] bc_divide
                 |
                 --- bc_divide

    33.57%       bc  bc                 [.] _one_mult
                 |
                 --- _one_mult

     7.61%       bc  bc                 [.] _bc_do_add
                 |
                 --- _bc_do_add
                     0x2000186a8

     6.88%       bc  bc                 [.] _bc_do_sub
                 |
                 --- _bc_do_sub

     0.42%       bc  libc-2.17.so       [.] __memcpy_ssse3_back
                 |
                 --- __memcpy_ssse3_back

The LBR call stack has following known limitations
 - Zero length calls are not filtered out by hardware
 - Exception handing such as setjmp/longjmp will have calls/returns not
   match
 - Pushing different return address onto the stack will have calls/returns
   not match
 - If callstack is deeper than the LBR, only the last entries are captured

Changes since v1
 - split change into more patches
 - introduce context switch callback and use it to flush LBR
 - use the context switch callback to save/restore LBR
 - dynamic allocate memory area for storing LBR stack, always switch the
   memory area during context switch
 - disable this feature by default
 - more description in change logs

Changes since v2
 - don't use xchg to switch PMU specific data
 - remove nr_branch_stack from struct perf_event_context
 - simplify the save/restore LBR stack logical
 - remove unnecessary 'has_branch_stack -> needs_branch_stack'
   conversion
 - more description in change logs



^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 40+ messages in thread

end of thread, other threads:[~2014-04-09 17:40 UTC | newest]

Thread overview: 40+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed)
-- links below jump to the message on this page --
2014-02-18  6:07 [PATCH v3 00/14] perf, x86: Haswell LBR call stack support Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 01/14] perf, x86: Reduce lbr_sel_map size Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 02/14] perf, core: introduce pmu context switch callback Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 03/14] perf, x86: use context switch callback to flush LBR stack Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 04/14] perf, x86: Basic Haswell LBR call stack support Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 05/14] perf, core: pmu specific data for perf task context Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 06/14] perf, core: always switch pmu specific data during context switch Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 07/14] perf, x86: track number of events that use LBR callstack Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 08/14] perf, x86: allocate space for storing LBR stack Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 09/14] perf, x86: Save/resotre LBR stack during context switch Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 10/14] perf, core: simplify need branch stack check Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 11/14] perf, core: Pass perf_sample_data to perf_callchain() Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 12/14] perf, x86: use LBR call stack to get user callchain Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 13/14] perf, x86: enable LBR callstack when recording callchain Yan, Zheng
2014-02-18  6:07 ` [PATCH v3 14/14] perf, x86: Discard zero length call entries in LBR call stack Yan, Zheng
2014-02-23 19:47 ` [PATCH v3 00/14] perf, x86: Haswell LBR call stack support Stephane Eranian
2014-02-24  1:07   ` Yan, Zheng
2014-02-24  7:14 ` Peter Zijlstra
2014-02-26  2:39 ` Andy Lutomirski
2014-02-26  7:04   ` Stephane Eranian
2014-02-26  8:57     ` Yan, Zheng
2014-02-26 16:03     ` Andy Lutomirski
2014-02-26 18:55       ` Andi Kleen
2014-02-26 18:59         ` Andy Lutomirski
2014-02-26 19:19           ` David Ahern
2014-02-26 19:25             ` Andy Lutomirski
2014-02-26 20:14               ` David Ahern
2014-02-26 20:26                 ` Andy Lutomirski
2014-04-09 11:48                   ` Peter Zijlstra
2014-04-09 16:48                     ` Andi Kleen
2014-04-09 17:40                       ` Andi Kleen
2014-02-26 20:32                 ` Peter Zijlstra
2014-02-26 20:53                 ` Andi Kleen
2014-02-26 21:15                   ` Peter Zijlstra
2014-02-26 21:33                     ` Andi Kleen
2014-02-26 21:34                   ` David Ahern
2014-02-26 21:42                     ` Andi Kleen
2014-02-27  9:09                       ` Stephane Eranian
2014-02-27 12:35           ` Ingo Molnar
2014-02-27 16:08             ` Andi Kleen

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