4 How to use LTTng and LTTV in a few lines :
6 This document is made of four parts : The first one explains how to install
7 LTTng and LTTV from Debian and RPM binary packages, the second one explains how
8 to install LTTng and LTTV from sources and the third one describes the steps
9 to follow to trace a system and view it. The fourth and last part explains
10 briefly how to add a new trace point to the kernel.
12 What you will typically want is to read sections 1 and 3 : install LTTng from
13 binary packages and use it. If there are no packages ready for your system, you
14 will have to install from sources (section 2) instead.
16 These operations are made for installing the LTTng 0.5.6 tracer on a
17 linux 2.6.15 kernel. You will also find instructions for installation of
18 LTTV 0.8.x : the Linux Trace Toolkit Viewer.
20 The following lttng patch is necessary to have the tracing hooks in the kernel.
21 The following ltt-control module controls the tracing.
23 Required programs and librairies are assumed to be automatically installed in an
24 installation with Debian or RPM packages. In the case of an installation from
25 sources, the dependencies are listed.
28 ** Current development status **
31 supported architectures :
32 Intel Pentium (UP/SMP) with TSC
35 supported architectures :
42 Author : Mathieu Desnoyers, September 2005
43 Last update : January 10, 2006
46 ***********************************************************
47 ** Section 1 * Installation from Debian or RPM packages **
48 ***********************************************************
50 ** NOTE : RPM and debian packages are only made once a version has been
51 thoroughly tested. If they do not exist at the moment, please install from
52 sources (see section 2 below).
55 * Install from RPM packages on Fedora Core 4 :
59 http://ltt.polymtl.ca/packages/fedora/RPMS
63 LTTng kernel and lttng-modules RPM are available for some architectures (i586,
64 i686). Feel free to help fix the spec files to have correct lttng-modules RPM
68 * Install from Deb packages on Debian :
70 You can use the ltt.polymtl.ca apt source to get LTTV for Debian :
72 Add the following two sources to your /etc/apt/sources.list :
74 deb http://ltt.polymtl.ca/packages/debian experimental main
75 deb-src http://ltt.polymtl.ca/packages/debian experimental main
78 * Install from precompiled binary packages (LTTV compiled only for i386, and
79 LTTng only for i686 smp), perform the following :
83 apt-get install lttv lttv-doc
84 apt-get install kernel-image-2.6.12-rc4-mm2-lttng-0.4.2
85 apt-get install lttng-modules-modules-2.6.12-rc4-mm2-lttng-0.4.2
86 * note : the packages are signed by myself. I am not considered a trusted
87 Debian source yet, so warnings are normal.
89 Then, follow the section "Editing the system wide configuration" in section 2.
91 * Create custom LTTV Debian packages
93 Binary packages are only available for i386. If you want to create your own LTTV
94 packages for other platforms, do :
100 dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot
102 You should then have your LTTV .deb files created for your architecture.
104 * Create custom LTTng packages
106 For building LTTng Debian packages :
109 apt-get install kernel-source-2.6.12-rc4-mm2-lttng-0.4.2
111 bzip2 -cd kernel-source-2.6.12-rc4-mm2-lttng-0.4.2.tar.bz2 | tar xvof -
112 cd kernel-source-2.6.12-rc4-mm2-lttng-0.4.2
113 make menuconfig (or xconfig or config) (customize your configuration)
114 make-kpkg kernel_image
116 You will then see your freshly created .deb in /usr/src. Install it with
117 dpkg -i /usr/src/(image-name).deb
119 You will also need to create a package for the lttng-modules :
123 apt-get source lttng-modules
124 cd kernel-source-2.6.12-rc4-mm2-lttng-0.4.2
125 make-kpkg --added_modules /usr/src/lttng-modules-0.3 modules_image
127 You will then see your freshly created .deb in /usr/src. Install it with
128 dpkg -i /usr/src/lttng-modules-modules-(your version).deb
131 Then, follow the section "Editing the system wide configuration" in section 2.
134 ***********************************************************
135 ** Section 2 * Installation from sources **
136 ***********************************************************
140 Tools needed to follow the package download steps :
147 You have to install the standard development librairies and programs necessary
148 to compile a kernel :
150 (from Documentation/Changes in the Linux kernel tree)
151 o Gnu C 2.95.3 # gcc --version
152 o Gnu make 3.79.1 # make --version
153 o binutils 2.12 # ld -v
154 o util-linux 2.10o # fdformat --version
155 o module-init-tools 0.9.10 # depmod -V
157 You might also want to have libncurses5 to have the text mode kernel
158 configuration menu, but there are alternatives.
160 Prerequisites for LTTV 0.6.x installation are :
163 gtk 2.4 or better development libraries
164 (Debian : libgtk2.0, libgtk2.0-dev)
165 (Fedora : gtk2, gtk2-devel)
166 note : For Fedora users : this might require at least core 3 from Fedora,
167 or you might have to compile your own GTK2 library.
168 glib 2.4 or better development libraries
169 (Debian : libglib2.0-0, libglib2.0-dev)
170 (Fedora : glib2, glib2-devel)
171 libpopt development libraries
172 (Debian : libpopt0, libpopt-dev)
174 libpango development libraries
175 (Debian : libpango1.0, libpango1.0-dev)
176 (Fedora : pango, pango-devel)
177 libc6 development librairies
178 (Debian : libc6, libc6-dev)
179 (Fedora : glibc, glibc)
182 * Getting the LTTng packages
187 (see http://ltt.polymtl.ca/lttng for package listing)
188 wget http://ltt.polymtl.ca/lttng/lttng-modules-0.4.tar.bz2
189 wget http://ltt.polymtl.ca/lttng/patch-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6.tar.bz2
190 bzip2 -cd lttng-modules-0.4.tar.bz2 | tar xvof -
191 bzip2 -cd patch-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6.tar.bz2 | tar xvof -
194 * Getting LTTng kernel sources
198 wget http://kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.6/testing/linux-2.6.15.tar.bz2
199 bzip2 -cd linux-2.6.15.tar.bz2 | tar xvof -
201 cat /usr/src/lttng/patch-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6* | patch -p1
203 mv linux-2.6.15 linux-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6
206 * Installing a LTTng kernel
209 cd /usr/src/linux-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6
210 make menuconfig (or make xconfig or make config)
211 Select the < Help > button if you are not familiar with kernel
213 Items preceded by [*] means they has to be built into the kernel.
214 Items preceded by [M] means they has to be built as modules.
215 Items preceded by [ ] means they should be removed.
216 go to the "Instrumentation Support" section
217 Select the following options :
218 [*] Linux Trace Toolkit Instrumentation Support
219 <M> or <*> Linux Trace Toolkit Tracer
220 It makes no difference for the rest of the procedure whether the Tracer
221 is compiled built-in or as a module.
223 [*] Align Linux Trace Toolkit Traces
224 do NOT activate (not ready yet) :
225 [ ] Activate Linux Trace Toolkit Heartbeat Timer
226 You may or may not activate instrumentation per facility. They are all
227 selected for logging by default. It can be used as a compile time filter to
228 enable/disable logging of events. It is useful to discard events with a
229 minimal impact on the system and especially useful for now, as the dynamic
230 filter has not been implemented yet.
240 Select the Linux 2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6 kernel in your boot loader.
243 * Install the ltt-modules
246 cd /usr/src/lttng/lttng-modules-0.4
247 KERNELDIR=/usr/src/linux-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6 make
248 KERNELDIR=/usr/src/linux-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6 make modules_install
251 * Editing the system wide configuration
253 You must activate relayfs and specify a mount point. This is typically done in
254 fstab such that it happens at boot time.
256 If you have never used RelayFS before, these operation would do this for you :
259 cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.lttng.bkp
260 echo "relayfs /mnt/relayfs relayfs rw 0 0" >> /etc/fstab
262 then, rebooting or issuing the following command will activate relayfs :
266 You need to load the ltt-control module to be able to control tracing from user
267 space. This is done by issuing the command :
271 You can automate at boot time loading the ltt-control module by :
273 echo ltt-control >> /etc/modules
276 * Getting and installing the LTTV package
280 wget http://ltt.polymtl.ca/packages/LinuxTraceToolkitViewer-0.8.5-17012006.tar.gz
281 gzip -cd LinuxTraceToolkitViewer-0.8.5-17012006.tar.gz | tar xvof -
282 cd LinuxTraceToolkitViewer-0.8.5-17012006
283 (refer to README to see the development libraries that must be installed on you
292 ***********************************************************
293 ** Section 3 * Using LTTng and LTTV **
294 ***********************************************************
296 * Use graphical LTTV to control tracing and analyse traces
298 lttv-gui (or /usr/local/bin/lttv-gui)
299 - Spot the "Tracing Control" icon : click on it
300 (it's a traffic light icon)
301 - enter the root password
305 * You should now see a trace
307 * Use text mode LTTng to control tracing
309 The tracing can be controlled from a terminal by using the lttctl command (as
314 lttctl -n trace -d -l /mnt/relayfs/ltt -t /tmp/trace
316 Stop tracing and destroy trace channels :
320 see lttctl --help for details.
325 Fell free to look in /usr/local/lib/lttv/plugins to see all the text and
326 graphical plugins available.
328 For example, a simple trace dump in text format is available with :
330 lttv -m textDump -t /tmp/trace
332 see lttv -m textDump --help for detailed command line options of textDump.
337 ***********************************************************
338 ** Section 4 * Adding new instrumentations with genevent **
339 ***********************************************************
341 * Getting and installing genevent
345 wget http://ltt.polymtl.ca/packages/genevent-0.6.tar.gz
346 gzip -cd genevent-0.6.tar.gz | tar xvof -
352 * Add new events to the kernel with genevent
355 cd /usr/local/share/LinuxTraceToolkitViewer/facilities
356 cp process.xml yourfacility.xml
357 * edit yourfacility.xml to fit your needs.
359 /usr/local/bin/genevent /usr/local/share/LinuxTraceToolkitViewer/facilities/yourfacility.xml
360 cp ltt-facility-yourfacility.h ltt-facility-id-yourfacility.h \
361 /usr/src/linux-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6/include/linux/ltt
362 cp ltt-facility-loader-yourfacility.c ltt-facility-loader-yourfacility.h \
363 /usr/src/linux-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6/ltt
364 * edit the kernel file you want to instrument
365 - Add #include <linux/ltt/ltt-facility-yourfacility.h> at the beginning
367 - Add a call to the tracing functions. See their names and parameters in
368 /usr/src/linux-2.6.15-lttng-0.5.6/include/linux/ltt/ltt-facility-yourfacility.h