[PATCH v2 1/2] perf inject: Support piped data with --convert-callchain

[Serhei Makarov <serhei@serhei.io>]

When profiling applications without framepointers or non-framepointer
distros, it's helpful to pipe stack sample data directly to perf
inject --convert-callchain, e.g.:

perf record -F 999 --call-graph dwarf -o - -- myapp \
  | perf inject --convert-callchain -i - -o perf.data

This piped setup doesn't store stack samples on disk, removing a major
performance bottleneck for DWARF stack unwinding as noted in [1].

To support piped output, write a modified copy of the event attributes
in perf_event__repipe_attr. This gets around the inability to modify
event attribute records in-place after they are written to the pipe.

[1]: https://rwmj.wordpress.com/2023/02/14/frame-pointers-vs-dwarf-my-verdict/
> The first most obvious thing is that even with the smallest stack
> data collection, DWARF’s perf.data is over 10 times larger, and it
> balloons even larger once you start to collect more reasonable stack
> sizes. For a single minute of data collection, collecting 10s of
> gigabytes of data is not very practical even on high end machines, and
> continuous performance analysis would be impossible at these data
> rates.

Signed-off-by: Serhei Makarov <serhei@serhei.io>

---

v2 changes)
 * Rebased onto perf-tools-next/perf-tools-next which includes the
 existing size-calculation fix (cf Ian Rogers, commit daac18e7c42c).
---
 tools/perf/builtin-inject.c | 68 +++++++++++++++++++++++++------------
 1 file changed, 46 insertions(+), 22 deletions(-)

diff --git a/tools/perf/builtin-inject.c b/tools/perf/builtin-inject.c
index ce7562fc788c..9fd02a6f5849 100644
--- a/tools/perf/builtin-inject.c
+++ b/tools/perf/builtin-inject.c
@@ -229,6 +229,7 @@ static int perf_event__repipe_attr(const struct perf_tool *tool,
 				   union perf_event *event,
 				   struct evlist **pevlist)
 {
+	union perf_event *event0;
 	struct perf_inject *inject = container_of(tool, struct perf_inject,
 						  tool);
 	struct perf_event_attr attr;
@@ -258,6 +259,25 @@ static int perf_event__repipe_attr(const struct perf_tool *tool,
 		goto out;
 	}
 
+	if (inject->convert_callchain) {
+		/* Copy event to repipe with corrected final attributes,
+		   without confusing downstream users of pevlist: */
+		event0 = event;
+		event = (void *)inject->event_copy;
+		if (event == NULL) {
+			inject->event_copy = malloc(PERF_SAMPLE_MAX_SIZE);
+			if (!inject->event_copy)
+				return -ENOMEM;
+			event = (void *)inject->event_copy;
+		}
+		memcpy(event, event0, event0->header.size);
+
+		event->attr.attr.sample_type &= ~(PERF_SAMPLE_REGS_USER | PERF_SAMPLE_STACK_USER);
+		event->attr.attr.sample_regs_user = 0;
+		event->attr.attr.sample_stack_user = 0;
+		event->attr.attr.exclude_callchain_user = 0;
+	}
+
 	if (!inject->itrace_synth_opts.set) {
 		ret = perf_event__repipe_synth(tool, event);
 		goto out;
@@ -519,6 +539,18 @@ static int perf_event__repipe_sample(const struct perf_tool *tool,
 	return perf_event__repipe_synth(tool, event);
 }
 
+static bool evsel__has_dwarf_callchain(struct evsel *evsel)
+{
+	struct perf_event_attr *attr = &evsel->core.attr;
+	const u64 dwarf_callchain_flags =
+		PERF_SAMPLE_STACK_USER | PERF_SAMPLE_REGS_USER | PERF_SAMPLE_CALLCHAIN;
+
+	if (!attr->exclude_callchain_user)
+		return false;
+
+	return (attr->sample_type & dwarf_callchain_flags) == dwarf_callchain_flags;
+}
+
 static int perf_event__convert_sample_callchain(const struct perf_tool *tool,
 						union perf_event *event,
 						struct perf_sample *sample,
@@ -526,7 +558,7 @@ static int perf_event__convert_sample_callchain(const struct perf_tool *tool,
 {
 	struct perf_inject *inject = container_of(tool, struct perf_inject, tool);
 	struct evsel *evsel = sample->evsel;
-	struct callchain_cursor *cursor = get_tls_callchain_cursor();
+	struct callchain_cursor *cursor;
 	union perf_event *event_copy = (void *)inject->event_copy;
 	struct callchain_cursor_node *node;
 	struct thread *thread;
@@ -535,6 +567,10 @@ static int perf_event__convert_sample_callchain(const struct perf_tool *tool,
 	u64 i, k;
 	int ret;
 
+	if (!evsel__has_dwarf_callchain(evsel))
+		return perf_event__repipe(tool, event, sample, machine);
+	cursor = get_tls_callchain_cursor();
+
 	if (event_copy == NULL) {
 		inject->event_copy = malloc(PERF_SAMPLE_MAX_SIZE);
 		if (!inject->event_copy)
@@ -2650,18 +2686,6 @@ static int __cmd_inject(struct perf_inject *inject)
 	return ret;
 }
 
-static bool evsel__has_dwarf_callchain(struct evsel *evsel)
-{
-	struct perf_event_attr *attr = &evsel->core.attr;
-	const u64 dwarf_callchain_flags =
-		PERF_SAMPLE_STACK_USER | PERF_SAMPLE_REGS_USER | PERF_SAMPLE_CALLCHAIN;
-
-	if (!attr->exclude_callchain_user)
-		return false;
-
-	return (attr->sample_type & dwarf_callchain_flags) == dwarf_callchain_flags;
-}
-
 int cmd_inject(int argc, const char **argv)
 {
 	struct perf_inject inject = {
@@ -2956,15 +2980,15 @@ int cmd_inject(int argc, const char **argv)
 	if (inject.convert_callchain) {
 		struct evsel *evsel;
 
-		if (inject.output.is_pipe || inject.session->data->is_pipe) {
-			pr_err("--convert-callchain cannot work with pipe\n");
-			goto out_delete;
-		}
-
-		evlist__for_each_entry(inject.session->evlist, evsel) {
-			if (!evsel__has_dwarf_callchain(evsel) && !evsel__is_dummy_event(evsel)) {
-				pr_err("--convert-callchain requires DWARF call graph.\n");
-				goto out_delete;
+		/* For on-disk data, check evlist up-front.
+		   For piped data, evlist is not available yet;
+		   check in perf_event__convert_sample_callchain. */
+		if (!inject.session->data->is_pipe) {
+			evlist__for_each_entry(inject.session->evlist, evsel) {
+				if (!evsel__has_dwarf_callchain(evsel) && !evsel__is_dummy_event(evsel)) {
+					pr_err("--convert-callchain requires DWARF call graph.\n");
+					goto out_delete;
+				}
 			}
 		}
 
-- 
2.56.0