# perf-timechart

## NAME



           perf-timechart - Tool to visualize total system behavior during a
           workload
    


## SYNOPSIS



    


## DESCRIPTION



           There are two variants of perf timechart:
    
               'perf timechart record <command>' to record the system level events
               of an arbitrary workload. By default timechart records only scheduler
               and CPU events (task switches, running times, CPU power states, etc),
               but it's possible to record IO (disk, network) activity using -I argument.
    
               'perf timechart' to turn a trace into a Scalable Vector Graphics file,
               that can be viewed with popular SVG viewers such as 'Inkscape'. Depending
               on the events in the perf.data file, timechart will contain scheduler/cpu
               events or IO events.
    
               In IO mode, every bar has two charts: upper and lower.
               Upper bar shows incoming events (disk reads, ingress network packets).
               Lower bar shows outgoing events (disk writes, egress network packets).
               There are also poll bars which show how much time application spent
               in poll/epoll/select syscalls.
    


## TIMECHART OPTIONS



           -o, --output=
               Select the output file (default: output.svg)
    
           -i, --input=
               Select the input file (default: perf.data unless stdin is a
               fifo)
    
           -w, --width=
               Select the width of the SVG file (default: 1000)
    
           -P, --power-only
               Only output the CPU power section of the diagram
    
           -T, --tasks-only
               Don’t output processor state transitions
    
           -p, --process
               Select the processes to display, by name or PID
    
           -f, --force
               Don’t complain, do it.
    
           --symfs=<directory>
               Look for files with symbols relative to this directory.
    
           -n, --proc-num
               Print task info for at least given number of tasks.
    
           -t, --topology
               Sort CPUs according to topology.
    
           --highlight=<duration_nsecs|task_name>
               Highlight tasks (using different color) that run more than
               given duration or tasks with given name. If number is given
               it’s interpreted as number of nanoseconds. If non-numeric
               string is given it’s interpreted as task name.
    
           --io-skip-eagain
               Don’t draw EAGAIN IO events.
    
           --io-min-time=<nsecs>
               Draw small events as if they lasted min-time. Useful when you
               need to see very small and fast IO. It’s possible to specify
               ms or us suffix to specify time in milliseconds or
               microseconds. Default value is 1ms.
    
           --io-merge-dist=<nsecs>
               Merge events that are merge-dist nanoseconds apart. Reduces
               number of figures on the SVG and makes it more
               render-friendly. It’s possible to specify ms or us suffix to
               specify time in milliseconds or microseconds. Default value is
               1us.
    


## RECORD OPTIONS



           -P, --power-only
               Record only power-related events
    
           -T, --tasks-only
               Record only tasks-related events
    
           -I, --io-only
               Record only io-related events
    
           -g, --callchain
               Do call-graph (stack chain/backtrace) recording
    


## EXAMPLES



           $ perf timechart record git pull
    
               [ perf record: Woken up 13 times to write data ]
               [ perf record: Captured and wrote 4.253 MB perf.data (~185801 samples) ]
    
           $ perf timechart
    
               Written 10.2 seconds of trace to output.svg.
    
           Record system-wide timechart:
    
               $ perf timechart record
    
               then generate timechart and highlight 'gcc' tasks:
    
               $ perf timechart --highlight gcc
    
           Record system-wide IO events:
    
               $ perf timechart record -I
    
               then generate timechart:
    
               $ perf timechart
    


* * *