Re: [PATCH tracing/kprobes 0/7] tracing/kprobes: kprobe-based event tracer update and perf support

[Christoph Hellwig <hch@infradead.org>]

On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 09:50:13PM +0200, Mark Wielaard wrote:
> On Fri, 2009-09-11 at 15:06 -0400, Christoph Hellwig wrote:
> > On Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 03:03:35PM -0400, Frank Ch. Eigler wrote:
> > > Frederic Weisbecker <fweisbec@gmail.com> writes:
> > > 
> > > > [...]  I'm really looking forward seeing this C expression-like
> > > > kprobe creation tool.  It seems powerful enough to replace printk +
> > > > kernel rebuild.  No need anymore to write some printk to debug,
> > > > worrying, [...]
> > > 
> > > To a large extent, systemtap had delivered this already some years
> > > ago, including the cushy ponies dancing in the sunlight.  While such
> > > low-level machinery is fine, some of our experience indicates that it
> > > is dramatically easier to use if high-level, symbolic, debugging data
> > > is used to compute probe locations and variable names/types/locations.
> > 
> > No, systemtap has been for years failing to delivers this in a way that
> > it could be usefully integrated into the kernel.
> 
> You are saying "No" to a claim Frank didn't even make.

He said systemtap had delivered it, which is not the case.  It has
implemented it, but not actually delivered it in a useful way.