Re: [RFC][PATCH 07/11] perf: Provide PERF_SAMPLE_REGS

Ingo Molnar
2010-03-04T02:59:42Z

* David Miller <davem@davemloft.net> wrote:

> And more generally aren't we supposed to be able to eventually analyze perf
> dumps on any platform not just the one 'perf' was built under?

A aidenote: in this cycle Arnaldo improved this aspect of perf (and those
changes are now upstream). In theory you should be able to do a 'perf record'
+ 'perf archive' on your Sparc box and then analyze it via 'perf report' on an
x86 box - and vice versa.

( Note, it was not tested in that specific combination - another combination
was tested by Arnaldo: 32-bit PA-RISC profile interpreted on 64-bit x86. )

So yes, i agree that at minimum perf should be able to tell apart the nature
of any recording and flag combinations it cannot handle (yet).

Btw, i think the most popular use of PEBS is its precise nature, not the
register dumping aspect per se. If the kernel can provide that transparently
then that's a usecase that does not need a register dump (in user-space that
is). It's borderline doable on x86 ...

Thanks,

Ingo