Code patching [LWN.net]

Code patching

Posted Apr 28, 2009 18:33 UTC (Tue) by corbet (editor, #1)
In reply to: On the value of static tracepoints by fuhchee
Parent article: On the value of static tracepoints

Sigh. I had figured that the immediate values/kernel marker stuff was being used here, but a closer look makes it clear that tracepoints do not use that infrastructure. Not sure why. Sorry for the confusion.

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Code patching

Posted Apr 28, 2009 19:21 UTC (Tue) by compudj (subscriber, #43335) [Link]

The Immediate Values are still waiting in the LTTng tree. Actually, I am waiting to see enough tracepoints in the mainline Linux kernel to justify the use of Immediate Values before I re-post them. Otherwise, I seem to be the only one convinced of their use, given the number of tracepoints present in the LTTng kernel tree.

Regarding Mainline, kmemtrace adds enough tracepoints to have a tiny, but measurable, impact on the localhost tbench workload (one would still have to figure out if it's really statistically significant by running more passes than I can given the time I have on my hands). Note that this workload is _very_ heavy on the number of tracepoint sites executed and sensitive to cache-line layout changes.

I won't fight to push them, but if there is sufficient willingness to have them merged, I will consider posting them as a "git pull" request.

Mathieu