OPTIONS¶
<command>...
Any command you can specify in a shell.
-e, --event=
Select the PMU event. Selection can be:
•a symbolic event name (use perf list to
list all events)
•a raw PMU event (eventsel+umask) in the form of
rNNN where NNN is a hexadecimal event descriptor.
•a symbolic or raw PMU event followed by an
optional colon and a list of event modifiers, e.g., cpu-cycles:p. See the
perf-list(1) man page for details on event modifiers.
•a symbolically formed PMU event like
pmu/param1=0x3,param2/ where
param1,
param2, etc are
defined as formats for the PMU in
/sys/bus/event_source/devices/<pmu>/format/*.
•a symbolically formed event like
pmu/config=M,config1=N,config3=K/
where M, N, K are numbers (in decimal, hex, octal format). Acceptable
values for each of 'config', 'config1' and 'config2' are defined by
corresponding entries in /sys/bus/event_source/devices/<pmu>/format/*
param1 and param2 are defined as formats for the PMU in:
/sys/bus/event_source/devices/<pmu>/format/*
There are also some parameters which are not defined in .../<pmu>/format/*.
These params can be used to overload default config values per event.
Here are some common parameters:
- 'period': Set event sampling period
- 'freq': Set event sampling frequency
- 'time': Disable/enable time stamping. Acceptable values are 1 for
enabling time stamping. 0 for disabling time stamping.
The default is 1.
- 'call-graph': Disable/enable callgraph. Acceptable str are "fp" for
FP mode, "dwarf" for DWARF mode, "lbr" for LBR mode and
"no" for disable callgraph.
- 'stack-size': user stack size for dwarf mode
- 'name' : User defined event name. Single quotes (') may be used to
escape symbols in the name from parsing by shell and tool
like this: name=\'CPU_CLK_UNHALTED.THREAD:cmask=0x1\'.
- 'aux-output': Generate AUX records instead of events. This requires
that an AUX area event is also provided.
- 'aux-sample-size': Set sample size for AUX area sampling. If the
'--aux-sample' option has been used, set aux-sample-size=0 to disable
AUX area sampling for the event.
See the linkperf:perf-list[1] man page for more parameters.
Note: If user explicitly sets options which conflict with the params,
the value set by the parameters will be overridden.
Also not defined in .../<pmu>/format/* are PMU driver specific
configuration parameters. Any configuration parameter preceded by
the letter '@' is not interpreted in user space and sent down directly
to the PMU driver. For example:
perf record -e some_event/@cfg1,@cfg2=config/ ...
will see 'cfg1' and 'cfg2=config' pushed to the PMU driver associated
with the event for further processing. There is no restriction on
what the configuration parameters are, as long as their semantic is
understood and supported by the PMU driver.
•a hardware breakpoint event in the form of
\mem:addr[/len][:access] where addr is the address in memory you want
to break in. Access is the memory access type (read, write, execute) it can be
passed as follows: \mem:addr[:[r][w][x]]. len is the range, number of
bytes from specified addr, which the breakpoint will cover. If you want to
profile read-write accesses in 0x1000, just set mem:0x1000:rw. If you
want to profile write accesses in [0x1000~1008), just set
mem:0x1000/8:w.
•a BPF source file (ending in .c) or a precompiled
object file (ending in .o) selects one or more BPF events. The BPF program can
attach to various perf events based on the ELF section names.
When processing a '.c' file, perf searches an installed LLVM to compile it
into an object file first. Optional clang options can be passed via the
'--clang-opt' command line option, e.g.:
perf record --clang-opt "-DLINUX_VERSION_CODE=0x50000" \
-e tests/bpf-script-example.c
Note: '--clang-opt' must be placed before '--event/-e'.
•a group of events surrounded by a pair of brace
("{event1,event2,...}"). Each event is separated by commas and the
group should be quoted to prevent the shell interpretation. You also need to
use --group on "perf report" to view group events together.
--filter=<filter>
Event filter. This option should follow an event selector (-e) which selects
either tracepoint event(s) or a hardware trace PMU (e.g. Intel PT or
CoreSight).
•tracepoint filters
In the case of tracepoints, multiple '--filter' options are combined
using '&&'.
•address filters
A hardware trace PMU advertises its ability to accept a number of
address filters by specifying a non-zero value in
/sys/bus/event_source/devices/<pmu>/nr_addr_filters.
Address filters have the format:
filter|start|stop|tracestop <start> [/ <size>] [@<file name>]
Where:
- 'filter': defines a region that will be traced.
- 'start': defines an address at which tracing will begin.
- 'stop': defines an address at which tracing will stop.
- 'tracestop': defines a region in which tracing will stop.
<file name> is the name of the object file, <start> is the offset to the
code to trace in that file, and <size> is the size of the region to
trace. 'start' and 'stop' filters need not specify a <size>.
If no object file is specified then the kernel is assumed, in which case
the start address must be a current kernel memory address.
<start> can also be specified by providing the name of a symbol. If the
symbol name is not unique, it can be disambiguated by inserting #n where
'n' selects the n'th symbol in address order. Alternately #0, #g or #G
select only a global symbol. <size> can also be specified by providing
the name of a symbol, in which case the size is calculated to the end
of that symbol. For 'filter' and 'tracestop' filters, if <size> is
omitted and <start> is a symbol, then the size is calculated to the end
of that symbol.
If <size> is omitted and <start> is '*', then the start and size will
be calculated from the first and last symbols, i.e. to trace the whole
file.
If symbol names (or '*') are provided, they must be surrounded by white
space.
The filter passed to the kernel is not necessarily the same as entered.
To see the filter that is passed, use the -v option.
The kernel may not be able to configure a trace region if it is not
within a single mapping. MMAP events (or /proc/<pid>/maps) can be
examined to determine if that is a possibility.
Multiple filters can be separated with space or comma.
--exclude-perf
Don’t record events issued by perf itself. This
option should follow an event selector (-e) which selects tracepoint event(s).
It adds a filter expression common_pid != $PERFPID to filters. If other
--filter exists, the new filter expression will be combined with them
by &&.
-a, --all-cpus
System-wide collection from all CPUs (default if no
target is specified).
-p, --pid=
Record events on existing process ID (comma separated
list).
-t, --tid=
Record events on existing thread ID (comma separated
list). This option also disables inheritance by default. Enable it by adding
--inherit.
-u, --uid=
Record events in threads owned by uid. Name or
number.
-r, --realtime=
Collect data with this RT SCHED_FIFO priority.
--no-buffering
Collect data without buffering.
-c, --count=
Event period to sample.
-o, --output=
Output file name.
-i, --no-inherit
Child tasks do not inherit counters.
-F, --freq=
Profile at this frequency. Use max to use the
currently maximum allowed frequency, i.e. the value in the
kernel.perf_event_max_sample_rate sysctl. Will throttle down to the currently
maximum allowed frequency. See --strict-freq.
--strict-freq
Fail if the specified frequency can’t be
used.
-m, --mmap-pages=
Number of mmap data pages (must be a power of two) or
size specification with appended unit character - B/K/M/G. The size is rounded
up to have nearest pages power of two value. Also, by adding a comma, the
number of mmap pages for AUX area tracing can be specified.
--group
Put all events in a single event group. This precedes the
--event option and remains only for backward compatibility. See --event.
-g
Enables call-graph (stack chain/backtrace) recording for
both kernel space and user space.
--call-graph
Setup and enable call-graph (stack chain/backtrace)
recording, implies -g. Default is "fp" (for user space).
The unwinding method used for kernel space is dependent on the
unwinder used by the active kernel configuration, i.e
CONFIG_UNWINDER_FRAME_POINTER (fp) or CONFIG_UNWINDER_ORC (orc)
Any option specified here controls the method used for user space.
Valid options are "fp" (frame pointer), "dwarf" (DWARF's CFI -
Call Frame Information) or "lbr" (Hardware Last Branch Record
facility).
In some systems, where binaries are build with gcc
--fomit-frame-pointer, using the "fp" method will produce bogus
call graphs, using "dwarf", if available (perf tools linked to
the libunwind or libdw library) should be used instead.
Using the "lbr" method doesn't require any compiler options. It
will produce call graphs from the hardware LBR registers. The
main limitation is that it is only available on new Intel
platforms, such as Haswell. It can only get user call chain. It
doesn't work with branch stack sampling at the same time.
When "dwarf" recording is used, perf also records (user) stack dump
when sampled. Default size of the stack dump is 8192 (bytes).
User can change the size by passing the size after comma like
"--call-graph dwarf,4096".
-q, --quiet
Don’t print any message, useful for
scripting.
-v, --verbose
Be more verbose (show counter open errors, etc).
-s, --stat
Record per-thread event counts. Use it with perf
report -T to see the values.
-d, --data
Record the sample virtual addresses.
--phys-data
Record the sample physical addresses.
-T, --timestamp
Record the sample timestamps. Use it with perf report
-D to see the timestamps, for instance.
-P, --period
Record the sample period.
--sample-cpu
Record the sample cpu.
-n, --no-samples
Don’t sample.
-R, --raw-samples
Collect raw sample records from all opened counters
(default for tracepoint counters).
-C, --cpu
Collect samples only on the list of CPUs provided.
Multiple CPUs can be provided as a comma-separated list with no space: 0,1.
Ranges of CPUs are specified with -: 0-2. In per-thread mode with inheritance
mode on (default), samples are captured only when the thread executes on the
designated CPUs. Default is to monitor all CPUs.
-B, --no-buildid
Do not save the build ids of binaries in the perf.data
files. This skips post processing after recording, which sometimes makes the
final step in the recording process to take a long time, as it needs to
process all events looking for mmap records. The downside is that it can
misresolve symbols if the workload binaries used when recording get locally
rebuilt or upgraded, because the only key available in this case is the
pathname. You can also set the "record.build-id" config variable to
'skip to have this behaviour permanently.
-N, --no-buildid-cache
Do not update the buildid cache. This saves some overhead
in situations where the information in the perf.data file (which includes
buildids) is sufficient. You can also set the "record.build-id"
config variable to no-cache to have the same effect.
-G name,..., --cgroup name,...
monitor only in the container (cgroup) called
"name". This option is available only in per-cpu mode. The cgroup
filesystem must be mounted. All threads belonging to container
"name" are monitored when they run on the monitored CPUs. Multiple
cgroups can be provided. Each cgroup is applied to the corresponding event,
i.e., first cgroup to first event, second cgroup to second event and so on. It
is possible to provide an empty cgroup (monitor all the time) using, e.g., -G
foo,,bar. Cgroups must have corresponding events, i.e., they always refer to
events defined earlier on the command line. If the user wants to track
multiple events for a specific cgroup, the user can use -e e1 -e e2 -G
foo,foo or just use -e e1 -e e2 -G foo.
If wanting to monitor, say, cycles for a cgroup and also
for system wide, this command line can be used: perf stat -e cycles -G
cgroup_name -a -e cycles.
-b, --branch-any
Enable taken branch stack sampling. Any type of taken
branch may be sampled. This is a shortcut for --branch-filter any. See
--branch-filter for more infos.
-j, --branch-filter
Enable taken branch stack sampling. Each sample captures
a series of consecutive taken branches. The number of branches captured with
each sample depends on the underlying hardware, the type of branches of
interest, and the executed code. It is possible to select the types of
branches captured by enabling filters. The following filters are defined:
•any: any type of branches
•any_call: any function call or system call
•any_ret: any function return or system call
return
•ind_call: any indirect branch
•call: direct calls, including far (to/from
kernel) calls
•u: only when the branch target is at the user
level
•k: only when the branch target is in the
kernel
•hv: only when the target is at the hypervisor
level
•in_tx: only when the target is in a hardware
transaction
•no_tx: only when the target is not in a hardware
transaction
•abort_tx: only when the target is a hardware
transaction abort
•cond: conditional branches
•save_type: save branch type during sampling in
case binary is not available later
The option requires at least one branch type among any, any_call,
any_ret, ind_call, cond. The privilege levels may be omitted, in which case,
the privilege levels of the associated event are applied to the branch
filter. Both kernel (k) and hypervisor (hv) privilege levels are subject to
permissions. When sampling on multiple events, branch stack sampling is
enabled for all the sampling events. The sampled branch type is the same for
all events. The various filters must be specified as a comma separated list:
--branch-filter any_ret,u,k Note that this feature may not be available on
all processors.
--weight
Enable weightened sampling. An additional weight is
recorded per sample and can be displayed with the weight and local_weight sort
keys. This currently works for TSX abort events and some memory events in
precise mode on modern Intel CPUs.
--namespaces
Record events of type PERF_RECORD_NAMESPACES. This
enables cgroup_id sort key.
--all-cgroups
Record events of type PERF_RECORD_CGROUP. This enables
cgroup sort key.
--transaction
Record transaction flags for transaction related
events.
--per-thread
Use per-thread mmaps. By default per-cpu mmaps are
created. This option overrides that and uses per-thread mmaps. A side-effect
of that is that inheritance is automatically disabled. --per-thread is ignored
with a warning if combined with -a or -C options.
-D, --delay=
After starting the program, wait msecs before measuring
(-1: start with events disabled). This is useful to filter out the startup
phase of the program, which is often very different.
-I, --intr-regs
Capture machine state (registers) at interrupt, i.e., on
counter overflows for each sample. List of captured registers depends on the
architecture. This option is off by default. It is possible to select the
registers to sample using their symbolic names, e.g. on x86, ax, si. To list
the available registers use --intr-regs=\?. To name registers, pass a comma
separated list such as --intr-regs=ax,bx. The list of register is architecture
dependent.
--user-regs
Similar to -I, but capture user registers at sample time.
To list the available user registers use --user-regs=\?.
--running-time
Record running and enabled time for read events
(:S)
-k, --clockid
Sets the clock id to use for the various time fields in
the perf_event_type records. See clock_gettime(). In particular
CLOCK_MONOTONIC and CLOCK_MONOTONIC_RAW are supported, some events might also
allow CLOCK_BOOTTIME, CLOCK_REALTIME and CLOCK_TAI.
-S, --snapshot
Select AUX area tracing Snapshot Mode. This option is
valid only with an AUX area tracing event. Optionally, certain snapshot
capturing parameters can be specified in a string that follows this option:
e: take one last snapshot on exit; guarantees that there is at least
one snapshot in the output file; <size>: if the PMU supports this,
specify the desired snapshot size.
In Snapshot Mode trace data is captured only when signal SIGUSR2
is received and on exit if the above e option is given.
--aux-sample[=OPTIONS]
Select AUX area sampling. At least one of the events
selected by the -e option must be an AUX area event. Samples on other events
will be created containing data from the AUX area. Optionally sample size may
be specified, otherwise it defaults to 4KiB.
--proc-map-timeout
When processing pre-existing threads /proc/XXX/mmap, it
may take a long time, because the file may be huge. A time out is needed in
such cases. This option sets the time out limit. The default value is 500
ms.
--switch-events
Record context switch events i.e. events of type
PERF_RECORD_SWITCH or PERF_RECORD_SWITCH_CPU_WIDE. In some cases (e.g. Intel
PT or CoreSight) switch events will be enabled automatically, which can be
suppressed by by the option --no-switch-events.
--clang-path=PATH
Path to clang binary to use for compiling BPF scriptlets.
(enabled when BPF support is on)
--clang-opt=OPTIONS
Options passed to clang when compiling BPF scriptlets.
(enabled when BPF support is on)
--vmlinux=PATH
Specify vmlinux path which has debuginfo. (enabled when
BPF prologue is on)
--buildid-all
Record build-id of all DSOs regardless whether
it’s actually hit or not.
--aio[=n]
Use <n> control blocks in asynchronous (Posix AIO)
trace writing mode (default: 1, max: 4). Asynchronous mode is supported only
when linking Perf tool with libc library providing implementation for Posix
AIO API.
--affinity=mode
Set affinity mask of trace reading thread according to
the policy defined by mode value: node - thread affinity mask is set to
NUMA node cpu mask of the processed mmap buffer cpu - thread affinity mask is
set to cpu of the processed mmap buffer
--mmap-flush=number
Specify minimal number of bytes that is extracted from
mmap data pages and processed for output. One can specify the number using
B/K/M/G suffixes.
The maximal allowed value is a quarter of the size of mmaped data
pages.
The default option value is 1 byte which means that every time
that the output writing thread finds some new data in the mmaped buffer the
data is extracted, possibly compressed (-z) and written to the output,
perf.data or pipe.
Larger data chunks are compressed more effectively in comparison
to smaller chunks so extraction of larger chunks from the mmap data pages is
preferable from the perspective of output size reduction.
Also at some cases executing less output write syscalls with
bigger data size can take less time than executing more output write
syscalls with smaller data size thus lowering runtime profiling
overhead.
-z, --compression-level[=n]
Produce compressed trace using specified level n
(default: 1 - fastest compression, 22 - smallest trace)
--all-kernel
Configure all used events to run in kernel space.
--all-user
Configure all used events to run in user space.
--kernel-callchains
Collect callchains only from kernel space. I.e. this
option sets perf_event_attr.exclude_callchain_user to 1.
--user-callchains
Collect callchains only from user space. I.e. this option
sets perf_event_attr.exclude_callchain_kernel to 1.
Don’t use both --kernel-callchains and --user-callchains at
the same time or no callchains will be collected.
--timestamp-filename Append timestamp to output file name.
--timestamp-boundary
Record timestamp boundary (time of first/last
samples).
--switch-output[=mode]
Generate multiple perf.data files, timestamp prefixed,
switching to a new one based on
mode value: "signal" - when
receiving a SIGUSR2 (default value) or <size> - when reaching the size
threshold, size is expected to be a number with appended unit character -
B/K/M/G <time> - when reaching the time threshold, size is expected to
be a number with appended unit character - s/m/h/d
Note: the precision of the size threshold hugely depends
on your configuration - the number and size of your ring
buffers (-m). It is generally more precise for higher sizes
(like >5M), for lower values expect different sizes.
A possible use case is to, given an external event, slice the
perf.data file that gets then processed, possibly via a perf script, to
decide if that particular perf.data snapshot should be kept or not.
Implies --timestamp-filename, --no-buildid and --no-buildid-cache.
The reason for the latter two is to reduce the data file switching overhead.
You can still switch them on with:
--switch-output --no-no-buildid --no-no-buildid-cache
--switch-output-event
Events that will cause the switch of the perf.data file,
auto-selecting --switch-output=signal, the results are similar as internally
the side band thread will also send a SIGUSR2 to the main one.
Uses the same syntax as --event, it will just not be recorded,
serving only to switch the perf.data file as soon as the --switch-output
event is processed by a separate sideband thread.
This sideband thread is also used to other purposes, like
processing the PERF_RECORD_BPF_EVENT records as they happen, asking the
kernel for extra BPF information, etc.
--switch-max-files=N
When rotating perf.data with --switch-output, only keep N
files.
--dry-run
Parse options then exit. --dry-run can be used to detect
errors in cmdline options.
perf record --dry-run -e can act as a BPF script compiler
if llvm.dump-obj in config file is set to true.
--tail-synthesize
Instead of collecting non-sample events (for example,
fork, comm, mmap) at the beginning of record, collect them during finalizing
an output file. The collected non-sample events reflects the status of the
system when record is finished.
--overwrite
Makes all events use an overwritable ring buffer. An
overwritable ring buffer works like a flight recorder: when it gets full, the
kernel will overwrite the oldest records, that thus will never make it to the
perf.data file.
When --overwrite and --switch-output are used perf
records and drops events until it receives a signal, meaning that something
unusual was detected that warrants taking a snapshot of the most current
events, those fitting in the ring buffer at that moment.
overwrite attribute can also be set or canceled for an
event using config terms. For example: cycles/overwrite/ and
instructions/no-overwrite/.
Implies --tail-synthesize.
--kcore
Make a copy of /proc/kcore and place it into a directory
with the perf data file.
--max-size=<size>
Limit the sample data max size, <size> is expected
to be a number with appended unit character - B/K/M/G
--num-thread-synthesize
The number of threads to run when synthesizing events for
existing processes. By default, the number of threads equals 1.
--control fd:ctl-fd[,ack-fd] Listen on ctl-fd descriptor for
command to control measurement (enable: enable events,
disable: disable events). Measurements can be started with events
disabled using --delay=-1 option. Optionally send control command completion
(ack\n) to ack-fd descriptor to synchronize with the controlling
process. Example of bash shell script to enable and disable events during
measurements:
#!/bin/bash
ctl_dir=/tmp/
ctl_fifo=${ctl_dir}perf_ctl.fifo test -p ${ctl_fifo} &&
unlink ${ctl_fifo} mkfifo ${ctl_fifo} exec {ctl_fd}<>${ctl_fifo}
ctl_ack_fifo=${ctl_dir}perf_ctl_ack.fifo test -p ${ctl_ack_fifo}
&& unlink ${ctl_ack_fifo} mkfifo ${ctl_ack_fifo} exec
{ctl_fd_ack}<>${ctl_ack_fifo}
perf record -D -1 -e cpu-cycles -a \ --control
fd:${ctl_fd},${ctl_fd_ack} \
— sleep 30 & perf_pid=$!
sleep 5 && echo enable >&${ctl_fd}
&& read -u ${ctl_fd_ack} e1 && echo
"enabled(${e1})" sleep 10 && echo disable
>&${ctl_fd} && read -u ${ctl_fd_ack} d1 && echo
"disabled(${d1})"
exec {ctl_fd_ack}>&- unlink ${ctl_ack_fifo}
exec {ctl_fd}>&- unlink ${ctl_fifo}
wait -n ${perf_pid} exit $?
