From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S1758051Ab0CaSGX (ORCPT ); Wed, 31 Mar 2010 14:06:23 -0400 Received: from braint.aber.ac.uk ([144.124.16.42]:42566 "EHLO braint.aber.ac.uk" rhost-flags-OK-OK-OK-OK) by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S1757797Ab0CaSGV (ORCPT ); Wed, 31 Mar 2010 14:06:21 -0400 X-Greylist: delayed 1806 seconds by postgrey-1.27 at vger.kernel.org; Wed, 31 Mar 2010 14:06:21 EDT DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; q=dns; c=nofws; s=outgoing; d=aber.ac.uk; h=Received:Received:Received:Message-ID:Date:Subject:From:To:User-Agent:MIME-Version:Content-Type:Content-Transfer-Encoding:X-Priority:Importance:X-UWA-Mid:X-UWA-Originating-IP:X-UWA-Sophos-Scanned; b=EAmXYu9/CZIxPZDdNZqR5o+xRmonYOmw0AeFWtiFkKsftcO2Pdcv7jbkoUk+qnbfEgvU3g+7YCSp+y0HZ5f7ggDsEFKAYvAw2iOnZh1JlBnBIhEJlGNBR/c0pWZosneK; Message-ID: <40fe3da502608d32ff82523c57a62da1.squirrel@webmail.aber.ac.uk> Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 18:36:08 +0100 Subject: Ftrace and Systemtap From: swb6@aber.ac.uk To: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org User-Agent: SquirrelMail/1.4.19 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT X-Priority: 3 (Normal) Importance: Normal X-UWA-Mid: 1Nx1pp-0000H1-48 X-UWA-Originating-IP: 144.124.16.33 X-UWA-Sophos-Scanned: from swb6@aber.ac.uk virus scanned OK Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org List-ID: X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Hi, I am currently writing up my dissertation based on dynamic tracing and reducing the learning curve to understanding the UNIX kernel. I used two dynamic tracing technologies (Systemtap and Dtrace) to monitor some virtual machines on a network. Whilst going over my initial review of technologies in the area of dynamic tracing I realised I had underestimated ftrace, and even dismissed it as not being dynamic. However I read hear (http://lwn.net/Articles/343766/) that you were as of July last year trying to introduce a patch that would allow ftrace the ability to dynamically trace. Also it would be completely instrumented from the command line without the need to compile a kernel module al la Systemtap. My question is do you think Systemtap will be replaced by ftrace in the future if so I feel I may need to include this fact in my updated technology review. Than you for your time Steve Brown