xref: /openbmc/linux/tools/perf/Documentation/perf-stat.txt (revision e2c75e76)

perf-stat(1)
============

NAME
----
perf-stat - Run a command and gather performance counter statistics

SYNOPSIS
--------
[verse]
'perf stat' [-e <EVENT> | --event=EVENT] [-a] <command>
'perf stat' [-e <EVENT> | --event=EVENT] [-a] -- <command> [<options>]
'perf stat' [-e <EVENT> | --event=EVENT] [-a] record [-o file] -- <command> [<options>]
'perf stat' report [-i file]

DESCRIPTION
-----------
This command runs a command and gathers performance counter statistics
from it.


OPTIONS
-------
<command>...::
	Any command you can specify in a shell.

record::
	See STAT RECORD.

report::
	See STAT REPORT.

-e::
--event=::
	Select the PMU event. Selection can be:

	- a symbolic event name (use 'perf list' to list all events)

	- a raw PMU event (eventsel+umask) in the form of rNNN where NNN is a
	  hexadecimal event descriptor.

	- a symbolically formed event like 'pmu/param1=0x3,param2/' where
	  param1 and param2 are defined as formats for the PMU in
	  /sys/bus/event_source/devices/<pmu>/format/*

	- a symbolically formed event like 'pmu/config=M,config1=N,config2=K/'
	  where M, N, K are numbers (in decimal, hex, octal format).
	  Acceptable values for each of 'config', 'config1' and 'config2'
	  parameters are defined by corresponding entries in
	  /sys/bus/event_source/devices/<pmu>/format/*

-i::
--no-inherit::
        child tasks do not inherit counters
-p::
--pid=<pid>::
        stat events on existing process id (comma separated list)

-t::
--tid=<tid>::
        stat events on existing thread id (comma separated list)


-a::
--all-cpus::
        system-wide collection from all CPUs (default if no target is specified)

-c::
--scale::
	scale/normalize counter values

-d::
--detailed::
	print more detailed statistics, can be specified up to 3 times

	   -d:          detailed events, L1 and LLC data cache
        -d -d:     more detailed events, dTLB and iTLB events
     -d -d -d:     very detailed events, adding prefetch events

-r::
--repeat=<n>::
	repeat command and print average + stddev (max: 100). 0 means forever.

-B::
--big-num::
        print large numbers with thousands' separators according to locale

-C::
--cpu=::
Count only on the list of CPUs provided. Multiple CPUs can be provided as a
comma-separated list with no space: 0,1. Ranges of CPUs are specified with -: 0-2.
In per-thread mode, this option is ignored. The -a option is still necessary
to activate system-wide monitoring. Default is to count on all CPUs.

-A::
--no-aggr::
Do not aggregate counts across all monitored CPUs.

-n::
--null::
        null run - don't start any counters

-v::
--verbose::
        be more verbose (show counter open errors, etc)

-x SEP::
--field-separator SEP::
print counts using a CSV-style output to make it easy to import directly into
spreadsheets. Columns are separated by the string specified in SEP.

-G name::
--cgroup name::
monitor only in the container (cgroup) called "name". This option is available only
in per-cpu mode. The cgroup filesystem must be mounted. All threads belonging to
container "name" are monitored when they run on the monitored CPUs. Multiple cgroups
can be provided. Each cgroup is applied to the corresponding event, i.e., first cgroup
to first event, second cgroup to second event and so on. It is possible to provide
an empty cgroup (monitor all the time) using, e.g., -G foo,,bar. Cgroups must have
corresponding events, i.e., they always refer to events defined earlier on the command
line.

-o file::
--output file::
Print the output into the designated file.

--append::
Append to the output file designated with the -o option. Ignored if -o is not specified.

--log-fd::

Log output to fd, instead of stderr.  Complementary to --output, and mutually exclusive
with it.  --append may be used here.  Examples:
     3>results  perf stat --log-fd 3          -- $cmd
     3>>results perf stat --log-fd 3 --append -- $cmd

--pre::
--post::
	Pre and post measurement hooks, e.g.:

perf stat --repeat 10 --null --sync --pre 'make -s O=defconfig-build/clean' -- make -s -j64 O=defconfig-build/ bzImage

-I msecs::
--interval-print msecs::
Print count deltas every N milliseconds (minimum: 10ms)
The overhead percentage could be high in some cases, for instance with small, sub 100ms intervals.  Use with caution.
	example: 'perf stat -I 1000 -e cycles -a sleep 5'

--metric-only::
Only print computed metrics. Print them in a single line.
Don't show any raw values. Not supported with --per-thread.

--per-socket::
Aggregate counts per processor socket for system-wide mode measurements.  This
is a useful mode to detect imbalance between sockets.  To enable this mode,
use --per-socket in addition to -a. (system-wide).  The output includes the
socket number and the number of online processors on that socket. This is
useful to gauge the amount of aggregation.

--per-core::
Aggregate counts per physical processor for system-wide mode measurements.  This
is a useful mode to detect imbalance between physical cores.  To enable this mode,
use --per-core in addition to -a. (system-wide).  The output includes the
core number and the number of online logical processors on that physical processor.

--per-thread::
Aggregate counts per monitored threads, when monitoring threads (-t option)
or processes (-p option).

-D msecs::
--delay msecs::
After starting the program, wait msecs before measuring. This is useful to
filter out the startup phase of the program, which is often very different.

-T::
--transaction::

Print statistics of transactional execution if supported.

STAT RECORD
-----------
Stores stat data into perf data file.

-o file::
--output file::
Output file name.

STAT REPORT
-----------
Reads and reports stat data from perf data file.

-i file::
--input file::
Input file name.

--per-socket::
Aggregate counts per processor socket for system-wide mode measurements.

--per-core::
Aggregate counts per physical processor for system-wide mode measurements.

-M::
--metrics::
Print metrics or metricgroups specified in a comma separated list.
For a group all metrics from the group are added.
The events from the metrics are automatically measured.
See perf list output for the possble metrics and metricgroups.

-A::
--no-aggr::
Do not aggregate counts across all monitored CPUs.

--topdown::
Print top down level 1 metrics if supported by the CPU. This allows to
determine bottle necks in the CPU pipeline for CPU bound workloads,
by breaking the cycles consumed down into frontend bound, backend bound,
bad speculation and retiring.

Frontend bound means that the CPU cannot fetch and decode instructions fast
enough. Backend bound means that computation or memory access is the bottle
neck. Bad Speculation means that the CPU wasted cycles due to branch
mispredictions and similar issues. Retiring means that the CPU computed without
an apparently bottleneck. The bottleneck is only the real bottleneck
if the workload is actually bound by the CPU and not by something else.

For best results it is usually a good idea to use it with interval
mode like -I 1000, as the bottleneck of workloads can change often.

The top down metrics are collected per core instead of per
CPU thread. Per core mode is automatically enabled
and -a (global monitoring) is needed, requiring root rights or
perf.perf_event_paranoid=-1.

Topdown uses the full Performance Monitoring Unit, and needs
disabling of the NMI watchdog (as root):
echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/nmi_watchdog
for best results. Otherwise the bottlenecks may be inconsistent
on workload with changing phases.

This enables --metric-only, unless overriden with --no-metric-only.

To interpret the results it is usually needed to know on which
CPUs the workload runs on. If needed the CPUs can be forced using
taskset.

--no-merge::
Do not merge results from same PMUs.

--smi-cost::
Measure SMI cost if msr/aperf/ and msr/smi/ events are supported.

During the measurement, the /sys/device/cpu/freeze_on_smi will be set to
freeze core counters on SMI.
The aperf counter will not be effected by the setting.
The cost of SMI can be measured by (aperf - unhalted core cycles).

In practice, the percentages of SMI cycles is very useful for performance
oriented analysis. --metric_only will be applied by default.
The output is SMI cycles%, equals to (aperf - unhalted core cycles) / aperf

Users who wants to get the actual value can apply --no-metric-only.

EXAMPLES
--------

$ perf stat -- make -j

 Performance counter stats for 'make -j':

    8117.370256  task clock ticks     #      11.281 CPU utilization factor
            678  context switches     #       0.000 M/sec
            133  CPU migrations       #       0.000 M/sec
         235724  pagefaults           #       0.029 M/sec
    24821162526  CPU cycles           #    3057.784 M/sec
    18687303457  instructions         #    2302.138 M/sec
      172158895  cache references     #      21.209 M/sec
       27075259  cache misses         #       3.335 M/sec

 Wall-clock time elapsed:   719.554352 msecs

CSV FORMAT
----------

With -x, perf stat is able to output a not-quite-CSV format output
Commas in the output are not put into "". To make it easy to parse
it is recommended to use a different character like -x \;

The fields are in this order:

	- optional usec time stamp in fractions of second (with -I xxx)
	- optional CPU, core, or socket identifier
	- optional number of logical CPUs aggregated
	- counter value
	- unit of the counter value or empty
	- event name
	- run time of counter
	- percentage of measurement time the counter was running
	- optional variance if multiple values are collected with -r
	- optional metric value
	- optional unit of metric

Additional metrics may be printed with all earlier fields being empty.

SEE ALSO
--------
linkperf:perf-top[1], linkperf:perf-list[1]