xref: /openbmc/qemu/docs/about/emulation.rst (revision 990d2c18)
1Emulation
2=========
3
4QEMU's Tiny Code Generator (TCG) provides the ability to emulate a
5number of CPU architectures on any supported host platform. Both
6:ref:`System Emulation` and :ref:`User Mode Emulation` are supported
7depending on the guest architecture.
8
9.. list-table:: Supported Guest Architectures for Emulation
10  :widths: 30 10 10 50
11  :header-rows: 1
12
13  * - Architecture (qemu name)
14    - System
15    - User
16    - Notes
17  * - Alpha
18    - Yes
19    - Yes
20    - Legacy 64 bit RISC ISA developed by DEC
21  * - Arm (arm, aarch64)
22    - :ref:`Yes<ARM-System-emulator>`
23    - Yes
24    - Wide range of features, see :ref:`Arm Emulation` for details
25  * - AVR
26    - :ref:`Yes<AVR-System-emulator>`
27    - No
28    - 8 bit micro controller, often used in maker projects
29  * - Hexagon
30    - No
31    - Yes
32    - Family of DSPs by Qualcomm
33  * - PA-RISC (hppa)
34    - Yes
35    - Yes
36    - A legacy RISC system used in HP's old minicomputers
37  * - x86 (i386, x86_64)
38    - :ref:`Yes<QEMU-PC-System-emulator>`
39    - Yes
40    - The ubiquitous desktop PC CPU architecture, 32 and 64 bit.
41  * - LoongArch
42    - Yes
43    - Yes
44    - A MIPS-like 64bit RISC architecture developed in China
45  * - m68k
46    - :ref:`Yes<ColdFire-System-emulator>`
47    - Yes
48    - Motorola 68000 variants and ColdFire
49  * - Microblaze
50    - Yes
51    - Yes
52    - RISC based soft-core by Xilinx
53  * - MIPS (mips*)
54    - :ref:`Yes<MIPS-System-emulator>`
55    - Yes
56    - Venerable RISC architecture originally out of Stanford University
57  * - OpenRISC
58    - :ref:`Yes<OpenRISC-System-emulator>`
59    - Yes
60    - Open source RISC architecture developed by the OpenRISC community
61  * - Power (ppc, ppc64)
62    - :ref:`Yes<PowerPC-System-emulator>`
63    - Yes
64    - A general purpose RISC architecture now managed by IBM
65  * - RISC-V
66    - :ref:`Yes<RISC-V-System-emulator>`
67    - Yes
68    - An open standard RISC ISA maintained by RISC-V International
69  * - RX
70    - :ref:`Yes<RX-System-emulator>`
71    - No
72    - A 32 bit micro controller developed by Renesas
73  * - s390x
74    - :ref:`Yes<s390x-System-emulator>`
75    - Yes
76    - A 64 bit CPU found in IBM's System Z mainframes
77  * - sh4
78    - Yes
79    - Yes
80    - A 32 bit RISC embedded CPU developed by Hitachi
81  * - SPARC (sparc, sparc64)
82    - :ref:`Yes<Sparc32-System-emulator>`
83    - Yes
84    - A RISC ISA originally developed by Sun Microsystems
85  * - Tricore
86    - Yes
87    - No
88    - A 32 bit RISC/uController/DSP developed by Infineon
89  * - Xtensa
90    - :ref:`Yes<Xtensa-System-emulator>`
91    - Yes
92    - A configurable 32 bit soft core now owned by Cadence
93
94.. _Semihosting:
95
96Semihosting
97-----------
98
99Semihosting is a feature defined by the owner of the architecture to
100allow programs to interact with a debugging host system. On real
101hardware this is usually provided by an In-circuit emulator (ICE)
102hooked directly to the board. QEMU's implementation allows for
103semihosting calls to be passed to the host system or via the
104``gdbstub``.
105
106Generally semihosting makes it easier to bring up low level code before a
107more fully functional operating system has been enabled. On QEMU it
108also allows for embedded micro-controller code which typically doesn't
109have a full libc to be run as "bare-metal" code under QEMU's user-mode
110emulation. It is also useful for writing test cases and indeed a
111number of compiler suites as well as QEMU itself use semihosting calls
112to exit test code while reporting the success state.
113
114Semihosting is only available using TCG emulation. This is because the
115instructions to trigger a semihosting call are typically reserved
116causing most hypervisors to trap and fault on them.
117
118.. warning::
119   Semihosting inherently bypasses any isolation there may be between
120   the guest and the host. As a result a program using semihosting can
121   happily trash your host system. Some semihosting calls (e.g.
122   ``SYS_READC``) can block execution indefinitely. You should only
123   ever run trusted code with semihosting enabled.
124
125Redirection
126~~~~~~~~~~~
127
128Semihosting calls can be re-directed to a (potentially remote) gdb
129during debugging via the :ref:`gdbstub<GDB usage>`. Output to the
130semihosting console is configured as a ``chardev`` so can be
131redirected to a file, pipe or socket like any other ``chardev``
132device.
133
134Supported Targets
135~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
136
137Most targets offer similar semihosting implementations with some
138minor changes to define the appropriate instruction to encode the
139semihosting call and which registers hold the parameters. They tend to
140presents a simple POSIX-like API which allows your program to read and
141write files, access the console and some other basic interactions.
142
143For full details of the ABI for a particular target, and the set of
144calls it provides, you should consult the semihosting specification
145for that architecture.
146
147.. note::
148   QEMU makes an implementation decision to implement all file
149   access in ``O_BINARY`` mode. The user-visible effect of this is
150   regardless of the text/binary mode the program sets QEMU will
151   always select a binary mode ensuring no line-terminator conversion
152   is performed on input or output. This is because gdb semihosting
153   support doesn't make the distinction between the modes and
154   magically processing line endings can be confusing.
155
156.. list-table:: Guest Architectures supporting Semihosting
157  :widths: 10 10 80
158  :header-rows: 1
159
160  * - Architecture
161    - Modes
162    - Specification
163  * - Arm
164    - System and User-mode
165    - https://github.com/ARM-software/abi-aa/blob/main/semihosting/semihosting.rst
166  * - m68k
167    - System
168    - https://sourceware.org/git/?p=newlib-cygwin.git;a=blob;f=libgloss/m68k/m68k-semi.txt;hb=HEAD
169  * - MIPS
170    - System
171    - Unified Hosting Interface (MD01069)
172  * - RISC-V
173    - System and User-mode
174    - https://github.com/riscv/riscv-semihosting-spec/blob/main/riscv-semihosting-spec.adoc
175  * - Xtensa
176    - System
177    - Tensilica ISS SIMCALL
178
179TCG Plugins
180-----------
181
182QEMU TCG plugins provide a way for users to run experiments taking
183advantage of the total system control emulation can have over a guest.
184It provides a mechanism for plugins to subscribe to events during
185translation and execution and optionally callback into the plugin
186during these events. TCG plugins are unable to change the system state
187only monitor it passively. However they can do this down to an
188individual instruction granularity including potentially subscribing
189to all load and store operations.
190
191See the developer section of the manual for details about
192:ref:`writing plugins<TCG Plugins>`.
193
194Usage
195~~~~~
196
197Any QEMU binary with TCG support has plugins enabled by default.
198Earlier releases needed to be explicitly enabled with::
199
200  configure --enable-plugins
201
202Once built a program can be run with multiple plugins loaded each with
203their own arguments::
204
205  $QEMU $OTHER_QEMU_ARGS \
206      -plugin contrib/plugins/libhowvec.so,inline=on,count=hint \
207      -plugin contrib/plugins/libhotblocks.so
208
209Arguments are plugin specific and can be used to modify their
210behaviour. In this case the howvec plugin is being asked to use inline
211ops to count and break down the hint instructions by type.
212
213Linux user-mode emulation also evaluates the environment variable
214``QEMU_PLUGIN``::
215
216  QEMU_PLUGIN="file=contrib/plugins/libhowvec.so,inline=on,count=hint" $QEMU
217
218QEMU plugins avoid to write directly to stdin/stderr, and use the log provided
219by the API (see function ``qemu_plugin_outs``).
220To show output, you may use this additional parameter::
221
222  $QEMU $OTHER_QEMU_ARGS \
223    -d plugin \
224    -plugin contrib/plugins/libhowvec.so,inline=on,count=hint
225
226Example Plugins
227~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
228
229There are a number of plugins included with QEMU and you are
230encouraged to contribute your own plugins plugins upstream. There is a
231``contrib/plugins`` directory where they can go. There are also some
232basic plugins that are used to test and exercise the API during the
233``make check-tcg`` target in ``tests/tcg/plugins`` that are never the
234less useful for basic analysis.
235
236Empty
237.....
238
239``tests/tcg/plugins/empty.c``
240
241Purely a test plugin for measuring the overhead of the plugins system
242itself. Does no instrumentation.
243
244Basic Blocks
245............
246
247``tests/tcg/plugins/bb.c``
248
249A very basic plugin which will measure execution in coarse terms as
250each basic block is executed. By default the results are shown once
251execution finishes::
252
253  $ qemu-aarch64 -plugin tests/plugin/libbb.so \
254      -d plugin ./tests/tcg/aarch64-linux-user/sha1
255  SHA1=15dd99a1991e0b3826fede3deffc1feba42278e6
256  bb's: 2277338, insns: 158483046
257
258Behaviour can be tweaked with the following arguments:
259
260.. list-table:: Basic Block plugin arguments
261  :widths: 20 80
262  :header-rows: 1
263
264  * - Option
265    - Description
266  * - inline=true|false
267    - Use faster inline addition of a single counter.
268  * - idle=true|false
269    - Dump the current execution stats whenever the guest vCPU idles
270
271Instruction
272...........
273
274``tests/tcg/plugins/insn.c``
275
276This is a basic instruction level instrumentation which can count the
277number of instructions executed on each core/thread::
278
279  $ qemu-aarch64 -plugin tests/plugin/libinsn.so \
280      -d plugin ./tests/tcg/aarch64-linux-user/threadcount
281  Created 10 threads
282  Done
283  cpu 0 insns: 46765
284  cpu 1 insns: 3694
285  cpu 2 insns: 3694
286  cpu 3 insns: 2994
287  cpu 4 insns: 1497
288  cpu 5 insns: 1497
289  cpu 6 insns: 1497
290  cpu 7 insns: 1497
291  total insns: 63135
292
293Behaviour can be tweaked with the following arguments:
294
295.. list-table:: Instruction plugin arguments
296  :widths: 20 80
297  :header-rows: 1
298
299  * - Option
300    - Description
301  * - inline=true|false
302    - Use faster inline addition of a single counter.
303  * - sizes=true|false
304    - Give a summary of the instruction sizes for the execution
305  * - match=<string>
306    - Only instrument instructions matching the string prefix
307
308The ``match`` option will show some basic stats including how many
309instructions have executed since the last execution. For
310example::
311
312   $ qemu-aarch64 -plugin tests/plugin/libinsn.so,match=bl \
313       -d plugin ./tests/tcg/aarch64-linux-user/sha512-vector
314   ...
315   0x40069c, 'bl #0x4002b0', 10 hits, 1093 match hits, Δ+1257 since last match, 98 avg insns/match
316   0x4006ac, 'bl #0x403690', 10 hits, 1094 match hits, Δ+47 since last match, 98 avg insns/match
317   0x4037fc, 'bl #0x4002b0', 18 hits, 1095 match hits, Δ+22 since last match, 98 avg insns/match
318   0x400720, 'bl #0x403690', 10 hits, 1096 match hits, Δ+58 since last match, 98 avg insns/match
319   0x4037fc, 'bl #0x4002b0', 19 hits, 1097 match hits, Δ+22 since last match, 98 avg insns/match
320   0x400730, 'bl #0x403690', 10 hits, 1098 match hits, Δ+33 since last match, 98 avg insns/match
321   0x4037ac, 'bl #0x4002b0', 12 hits, 1099 match hits, Δ+20 since last match, 98 avg insns/match
322   ...
323
324For more detailed execution tracing see the ``execlog`` plugin for
325other options.
326
327Memory
328......
329
330``tests/tcg/plugins/mem.c``
331
332Basic instruction level memory instrumentation::
333
334  $ qemu-aarch64 -plugin tests/plugin/libmem.so,inline=true \
335      -d plugin ./tests/tcg/aarch64-linux-user/sha1
336  SHA1=15dd99a1991e0b3826fede3deffc1feba42278e6
337  inline mem accesses: 79525013
338
339Behaviour can be tweaked with the following arguments:
340
341.. list-table:: Memory plugin arguments
342  :widths: 20 80
343  :header-rows: 1
344
345  * - Option
346    - Description
347  * - inline=true|false
348    - Use faster inline addition of a single counter
349  * - callback=true|false
350    - Use callbacks on each memory instrumentation.
351  * - hwaddr=true|false
352    - Count IO accesses (only for system emulation)
353
354System Calls
355............
356
357``tests/tcg/plugins/syscall.c``
358
359A basic syscall tracing plugin. This only works for user-mode. By
360default it will give a summary of syscall stats at the end of the
361run::
362
363  $ qemu-aarch64 -plugin tests/plugin/libsyscall \
364      -d plugin ./tests/tcg/aarch64-linux-user/threadcount
365  Created 10 threads
366  Done
367  syscall no.  calls  errors
368  226          12     0
369  99           11     11
370  115          11     0
371  222          11     0
372  93           10     0
373  220          10     0
374  233          10     0
375  215          8      0
376  214          4      0
377  134          2      0
378  64           2      0
379  96           1      0
380  94           1      0
381  80           1      0
382  261          1      0
383  78           1      0
384  160          1      0
385  135          1      0
386
387Test inline operations
388......................
389
390``tests/plugins/inline.c``
391
392This plugin is used for testing all inline operations, conditional callbacks and
393scoreboard. It prints a per-cpu summary of all events.
394
395
396Hot Blocks
397..........
398
399``contrib/plugins/hotblocks.c``
400
401The hotblocks plugin allows you to examine the where hot paths of
402execution are in your program. Once the program has finished you will
403get a sorted list of blocks reporting the starting PC, translation
404count, number of instructions and execution count. This will work best
405with linux-user execution as system emulation tends to generate
406re-translations as blocks from different programs get swapped in and
407out of system memory.
408
409Example::
410
411  $ qemu-aarch64 \
412    -plugin contrib/plugins/libhotblocks.so -d plugin \
413    ./tests/tcg/aarch64-linux-user/sha1
414  SHA1=15dd99a1991e0b3826fede3deffc1feba42278e6
415  collected 903 entries in the hash table
416  pc, tcount, icount, ecount
417  0x0000000041ed10, 1, 5, 66087
418  0x000000004002b0, 1, 4, 66087
419  ...
420
421
422Hot Pages
423.........
424
425``contrib/plugins/hotpages.c``
426
427Similar to hotblocks but this time tracks memory accesses::
428
429  $ qemu-aarch64 \
430    -plugin contrib/plugins/libhotpages.so -d plugin \
431    ./tests/tcg/aarch64-linux-user/sha1
432  SHA1=15dd99a1991e0b3826fede3deffc1feba42278e6
433  Addr, RCPUs, Reads, WCPUs, Writes
434  0x000055007fe000, 0x0001, 31747952, 0x0001, 8835161
435  0x000055007ff000, 0x0001, 29001054, 0x0001, 8780625
436  0x00005500800000, 0x0001, 687465, 0x0001, 335857
437  0x0000000048b000, 0x0001, 130594, 0x0001, 355
438  0x0000000048a000, 0x0001, 1826, 0x0001, 11
439
440The hotpages plugin can be configured using the following arguments:
441
442.. list-table:: Hot pages arguments
443  :widths: 20 80
444  :header-rows: 1
445
446  * - Option
447    - Description
448  * - sortby=reads|writes|address
449    - Log the data sorted by either the number of reads, the number of writes, or
450      memory address. (Default: entries are sorted by the sum of reads and writes)
451  * - io=on
452    - Track IO addresses. Only relevant to full system emulation. (Default: off)
453  * - pagesize=N
454    - The page size used. (Default: N = 4096)
455
456Instruction Distribution
457........................
458
459``contrib/plugins/howvec.c``
460
461This is an instruction classifier so can be used to count different
462types of instructions. It has a number of options to refine which get
463counted. You can give a value to the ``count`` argument for a class of
464instructions to break it down fully, so for example to see all the system
465registers accesses::
466
467  $ qemu-system-aarch64 $(QEMU_ARGS) \
468    -append "root=/dev/sda2 systemd.unit=benchmark.service" \
469    -smp 4 -plugin ./contrib/plugins/libhowvec.so,count=sreg -d plugin
470
471which will lead to a sorted list after the class breakdown::
472
473  Instruction Classes:
474  Class:   UDEF                   not counted
475  Class:   SVE                    (68 hits)
476  Class:   PCrel addr             (47789483 hits)
477  Class:   Add/Sub (imm)          (192817388 hits)
478  Class:   Logical (imm)          (93852565 hits)
479  Class:   Move Wide (imm)        (76398116 hits)
480  Class:   Bitfield               (44706084 hits)
481  Class:   Extract                (5499257 hits)
482  Class:   Cond Branch (imm)      (147202932 hits)
483  Class:   Exception Gen          (193581 hits)
484  Class:     NOP                  not counted
485  Class:   Hints                  (6652291 hits)
486  Class:   Barriers               (8001661 hits)
487  Class:   PSTATE                 (1801695 hits)
488  Class:   System Insn            (6385349 hits)
489  Class:   System Reg             counted individually
490  Class:   Branch (reg)           (69497127 hits)
491  Class:   Branch (imm)           (84393665 hits)
492  Class:   Cmp & Branch           (110929659 hits)
493  Class:   Tst & Branch           (44681442 hits)
494  Class:   AdvSimd ldstmult       (736 hits)
495  Class:   ldst excl              (9098783 hits)
496  Class:   Load Reg (lit)         (87189424 hits)
497  Class:   ldst noalloc pair      (3264433 hits)
498  Class:   ldst pair              (412526434 hits)
499  Class:   ldst reg (imm)         (314734576 hits)
500  Class: Loads & Stores           (2117774 hits)
501  Class: Data Proc Reg            (223519077 hits)
502  Class: Scalar FP                (31657954 hits)
503  Individual Instructions:
504  Instr: mrs x0, sp_el0           (2682661 hits)  (op=0xd5384100/  System Reg)
505  Instr: mrs x1, tpidr_el2        (1789339 hits)  (op=0xd53cd041/  System Reg)
506  Instr: mrs x2, tpidr_el2        (1513494 hits)  (op=0xd53cd042/  System Reg)
507  Instr: mrs x0, tpidr_el2        (1490823 hits)  (op=0xd53cd040/  System Reg)
508  Instr: mrs x1, sp_el0           (933793 hits)   (op=0xd5384101/  System Reg)
509  Instr: mrs x2, sp_el0           (699516 hits)   (op=0xd5384102/  System Reg)
510  Instr: mrs x4, tpidr_el2        (528437 hits)   (op=0xd53cd044/  System Reg)
511  Instr: mrs x30, ttbr1_el1       (480776 hits)   (op=0xd538203e/  System Reg)
512  Instr: msr ttbr1_el1, x30       (480713 hits)   (op=0xd518203e/  System Reg)
513  Instr: msr vbar_el1, x30        (480671 hits)   (op=0xd518c01e/  System Reg)
514  ...
515
516To find the argument shorthand for the class you need to examine the
517source code of the plugin at the moment, specifically the ``*opt``
518argument in the InsnClassExecCount tables.
519
520Lockstep Execution
521..................
522
523``contrib/plugins/lockstep.c``
524
525This is a debugging tool for developers who want to find out when and
526where execution diverges after a subtle change to TCG code generation.
527It is not an exact science and results are likely to be mixed once
528asynchronous events are introduced. While the use of -icount can
529introduce determinism to the execution flow it doesn't always follow
530the translation sequence will be exactly the same. Typically this is
531caused by a timer firing to service the GUI causing a block to end
532early. However in some cases it has proved to be useful in pointing
533people at roughly where execution diverges. The only argument you need
534for the plugin is a path for the socket the two instances will
535communicate over::
536
537
538  $ qemu-system-sparc -monitor none -parallel none \
539    -net none -M SS-20 -m 256 -kernel day11/zImage.elf \
540    -plugin ./contrib/plugins/liblockstep.so,sockpath=lockstep-sparc.sock \
541    -d plugin,nochain
542
543which will eventually report::
544
545  qemu-system-sparc: warning: nic lance.0 has no peer
546  @ 0x000000ffd06678 vs 0x000000ffd001e0 (2/1 since last)
547  @ 0x000000ffd07d9c vs 0x000000ffd06678 (3/1 since last)
548  Δ insn_count @ 0x000000ffd07d9c (809900609) vs 0x000000ffd06678 (809900612)
549    previously @ 0x000000ffd06678/10 (809900609 insns)
550    previously @ 0x000000ffd001e0/4 (809900599 insns)
551    previously @ 0x000000ffd080ac/2 (809900595 insns)
552    previously @ 0x000000ffd08098/5 (809900593 insns)
553    previously @ 0x000000ffd080c0/1 (809900588 insns)
554
555
556Hardware Profile
557................
558
559``contrib/plugins/hwprofile.c``
560
561The hwprofile tool can only be used with system emulation and allows
562the user to see what hardware is accessed how often. It has a number of options:
563
564.. list-table:: Hardware Profile arguments
565  :widths: 20 80
566  :header-rows: 1
567
568  * - Option
569    - Description
570  * - track=[read|write]
571    - By default the plugin tracks both reads and writes. You can use
572      this option to limit the tracking to just one class of accesses.
573  * - source
574    - Will include a detailed break down of what the guest PC that made the
575      access was. Not compatible with the pattern option. Example output::
576
577        cirrus-low-memory @ 0xfffffd00000a0000
578         pc:fffffc0000005cdc, 1, 256
579         pc:fffffc0000005ce8, 1, 256
580         pc:fffffc0000005cec, 1, 256
581
582  * - pattern
583    - Instead break down the accesses based on the offset into the HW
584      region. This can be useful for seeing the most used registers of
585      a device. Example output::
586
587        pci0-conf @ 0xfffffd01fe000000
588          off:00000004, 1, 1
589          off:00000010, 1, 3
590          off:00000014, 1, 3
591          off:00000018, 1, 2
592          off:0000001c, 1, 2
593          off:00000020, 1, 2
594          ...
595
596
597Execution Log
598.............
599
600``contrib/plugins/execlog.c``
601
602The execlog tool traces executed instructions with memory access. It can be used
603for debugging and security analysis purposes.
604Please be aware that this will generate a lot of output.
605
606The plugin needs default argument::
607
608  $ qemu-system-arm $(QEMU_ARGS) \
609    -plugin ./contrib/plugins/libexeclog.so -d plugin
610
611which will output an execution trace following this structure::
612
613  # vCPU, vAddr, opcode, disassembly[, load/store, memory addr, device]...
614  0, 0xa12, 0xf8012400, "movs r4, #0"
615  0, 0xa14, 0xf87f42b4, "cmp r4, r6"
616  0, 0xa16, 0xd206, "bhs #0xa26"
617  0, 0xa18, 0xfff94803, "ldr r0, [pc, #0xc]", load, 0x00010a28, RAM
618  0, 0xa1a, 0xf989f000, "bl #0xd30"
619  0, 0xd30, 0xfff9b510, "push {r4, lr}", store, 0x20003ee0, RAM, store, 0x20003ee4, RAM
620  0, 0xd32, 0xf9893014, "adds r0, #0x14"
621  0, 0xd34, 0xf9c8f000, "bl #0x10c8"
622  0, 0x10c8, 0xfff96c43, "ldr r3, [r0, #0x44]", load, 0x200000e4, RAM
623
624Please note that you need to configure QEMU with Capstone support to get disassembly.
625
626The output can be filtered to only track certain instructions or
627addresses using the ``ifilter`` or ``afilter`` options. You can stack the
628arguments if required::
629
630  $ qemu-system-arm $(QEMU_ARGS) \
631    -plugin ./contrib/plugins/libexeclog.so,ifilter=st1w,afilter=0x40001808 -d plugin
632
633This plugin can also dump registers when they change value. Specify the name of the
634registers with multiple ``reg`` options. You can also use glob style matching if you wish::
635
636  $ qemu-system-arm $(QEMU_ARGS) \
637    -plugin ./contrib/plugins/libexeclog.so,reg=\*_el2,reg=sp -d plugin
638
639Be aware that each additional register to check will slow down
640execution quite considerably. You can optimise the number of register
641checks done by using the rdisas option. This will only instrument
642instructions that mention the registers in question in disassembly.
643This is not foolproof as some instructions implicitly change
644instructions. You can use the ifilter to catch these cases::
645
646  $ qemu-system-arm $(QEMU_ARGS) \
647    -plugin ./contrib/plugins/libexeclog.so,ifilter=msr,ifilter=blr,reg=x30,reg=\*_el1,rdisas=on
648
649Cache Modelling
650...............
651
652``contrib/plugins/cache.c``
653
654Cache modelling plugin that measures the performance of a given L1 cache
655configuration, and optionally a unified L2 per-core cache when a given working
656set is run::
657
658  $ qemu-x86_64 -plugin ./contrib/plugins/libcache.so \
659      -d plugin -D cache.log ./tests/tcg/x86_64-linux-user/float_convs
660
661will report the following::
662
663    core #, data accesses, data misses, dmiss rate, insn accesses, insn misses, imiss rate
664    0       996695         508             0.0510%  2642799        18617           0.7044%
665
666    address, data misses, instruction
667    0x424f1e (_int_malloc), 109, movq %rax, 8(%rcx)
668    0x41f395 (_IO_default_xsputn), 49, movb %dl, (%rdi, %rax)
669    0x42584d (ptmalloc_init.part.0), 33, movaps %xmm0, (%rax)
670    0x454d48 (__tunables_init), 20, cmpb $0, (%r8)
671    ...
672
673    address, fetch misses, instruction
674    0x4160a0 (__vfprintf_internal), 744, movl $1, %ebx
675    0x41f0a0 (_IO_setb), 744, endbr64
676    0x415882 (__vfprintf_internal), 744, movq %r12, %rdi
677    0x4268a0 (__malloc), 696, andq $0xfffffffffffffff0, %rax
678    ...
679
680The plugin has a number of arguments, all of them are optional:
681
682.. list-table:: Cache modelling arguments
683  :widths: 20 80
684  :header-rows: 1
685
686  * - Option
687    - Description
688  * - limit=N
689    - Print top N icache and dcache thrashing instructions along with
690      their address, number of misses, and its disassembly. (default: 32)
691  * - icachesize=N
692      iblksize=B
693      iassoc=A
694    - Instruction cache configuration arguments. They specify the
695      cache size, block size, and associativity of the instruction
696      cache, respectively. (default: N = 16384, B = 64, A = 8)
697  * - dcachesize=N
698    - Data cache size (default: 16834)
699  * - dblksize=B
700    - Data cache block size (default: 64)
701  * - dassoc=A
702    - Data cache associativity (default: 8)
703  * - evict=POLICY
704    - Sets the eviction policy to POLICY. Available policies are:
705      ``lru``, ``fifo``, and ``rand``. The plugin will use
706      the specified policy for both instruction and data caches.
707      (default: POLICY = ``lru``)
708  * - cores=N
709    - Sets the number of cores for which we maintain separate icache
710      and dcache. (default: for linux-user, N = 1, for full system
711      emulation: N = cores available to guest)
712  * - l2=on
713    - Simulates a unified L2 cache (stores blocks for both
714      instructions and data) using the default L2 configuration (cache
715      size = 2MB, associativity = 16-way, block size = 64B).
716  * - l2cachesize=N
717    - L2 cache size (default: 2097152 (2MB)), implies ``l2=on``
718  * - l2blksize=B
719    - L2 cache block size (default: 64), implies ``l2=on``
720  * - l2assoc=A
721    - L2 cache associativity (default: 16), implies ``l2=on``
722
723Stop on Trigger
724...............
725
726``contrib/plugins/stoptrigger.c``
727
728The stoptrigger plugin allows to setup triggers to stop emulation.
729It can be used for research purposes to launch some code and precisely stop it
730and understand where its execution flow went.
731
732Two types of triggers can be configured: a count of instructions to stop at,
733or an address to stop at. Multiple triggers can be set at once.
734
735By default, QEMU will exit with return code 0. A custom return code can be
736configured for each trigger using ``:CODE`` syntax.
737
738For example, to stop at the 20-th instruction with return code 41, at address
7390xd4 with return code 0 or at address 0xd8 with return code 42::
740
741  $ qemu-system-aarch64 $(QEMU_ARGS) \
742    -plugin ./contrib/plugins/libstoptrigger.so,icount=20:41,addr=0xd4,addr=0xd8:42 -d plugin
743
744The plugin will log the reason of exit, for example::
745
746  0xd4 reached, exiting
747
748Limit instructions per second
749.............................
750
751This plugin can limit the number of Instructions Per Second that are executed::
752
753    # get number of instructions
754    $ num_insn=$(./build/qemu-x86_64 -plugin ./build/tests/plugin/libinsn.so -d plugin /bin/true |& grep total | sed -e 's/.*: //')
755    # limit speed to execute in 10 seconds
756    $ time ./build/qemu-x86_64 -plugin ./build/contrib/plugins/libips.so,ips=$(($num_insn/10)) /bin/true
757    real 10.000s
758
759
760.. list-table:: IPS arguments
761  :widths: 20 80
762  :header-rows: 1
763
764  * - Option
765    - Description
766  * - ips=N
767    - Maximum number of instructions per cpu that can be executed in one second.
768      The plugin will sleep when the given number of instructions is reached.
769
770Other emulation features
771------------------------
772
773When running system emulation you can also enable deterministic
774execution which allows for repeatable record/replay debugging. See
775:ref:`Record/Replay<replay>` for more details.
776
777