SystemTap

SystemTap provides free software (GPL) infrastructure to simplify the gathering of information about the running Linux system.

Installation

Simply install systemtap or systemtap-git^AUR, all done. Compare it to the most recent upstream release at [1].

Consider also building it from sources at [2], where support for newer kernels or distributions makes first appearance.

Standard kernel

You will need at least the linux-headers package installed.

Because Arch permanently strips debugging data from its distributed binaries (including the kernel), many normal/fancier systemtap capabilities are simply not available, so many examples at /usr/share/doc/systemtap/examples will not work. However, see stapprobes(3) for the NON-DWARF and AUTO-DWARF probe types for what should still work, for example:

• kernel tracepoints: kernel.trace("*")
• user-space probes: process("...").function("...") (for programs you build yourself with -g)
• user-space markers: process("...").mark("...") (if they were configured with the <sys/sdt.h> markers)
• perfctr-based probes: perf.*
• non-dwarf kernel probes: kprobe.function("...") and nd_syscall.* tapset (if a /boot/System.map* file is available, see below).

Kernel rebuild

You may consider to build a linux-custom package to run SystemTap, but rebuilding the linux package is easy and efficient.

Prepare

First, follow the steps at Kernel/Arch build system#Getting the ingredients to get the original kernel build files. Then use makepkg --verifysource to get the additional files. By performing the verification, you can safely skip the steps on "Update checksum".

Modify config

Edit config.x86_64, turn on these options:

• CONFIG_KPROBES=y
• CONFIG_KPROBES_SANITY_TEST=n
• CONFIG_KPROBE_EVENT=y
• CONFIG_NET_DCCPPROBE=m
• CONFIG_NET_SCTPPROBE=m
• CONFIG_NET_TCPPROBE=y
• CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO=y
• CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_REDUCED=n
• CONFIG_X86_DECODER_SELFTEST=n
• CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_VTA=y

By default only CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO and CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_REDUCED are not set.

With the current linux kernel (tested with 3.15.2) you can simply append these lines into config.x86_64:

x86_64

echo '
CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO=y
CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO_REDUCED=n
' >> config.x86_64

Note: If you want to put these lines into a self-maintained script, do not insert any space before CONFIG_* lines.

Update checksum

Tip: You can safely skip this step if you verified the source files previously.

Run sha256sum config.x86_64 to get a new sha256sum.

In PKGBUILD file, the sha256sum=('sum-of-first' ... 'sum-of-last') has the same order with source=('first-source' ... 'last-source'), put your new sha256sum in the right place.

Build and install

Optional: It is recommended to set MAKEFLAGS="-j16" in /etc/makepkg.conf to speed up the compilation.

You will need about 12 GB disk space for this build. Consider using an in-memory tmpfs if you have large DRAM. Run makepkg or makepkg --skipchecksums to compile, then simply sudo pacman -U *.pkg.tar.gz to install the packages. pacman will tell you reinstall, and you should say y.

linux and linux-headers should be reinstalled, linux-docs does not matter.

Via this method, external modules (e.g. nvidia and virtualbox) do not need to be rebuilt.

Build custom kernel

Please reference this README

Troubleshooting

Pass 4 fails when launching

If you get the following error message, try into install systemtap-git^AUR

/usr/share/systemtap/runtime/stat.c:214:2: error: 'cpu_possible_map' undeclared (first use in this function)

System.map is missing

You can recover it where you build your linux kernel with DEBUG_INFO enabled

# cp src/linux-3.6/System.map /boot/System.map-3.6.7-1-ARCH

Alternatively,

# cp /proc/kallsyms /boot/System.map-$(uname -r)

Process return probes not available

If you are sure that your kernel configuration is correct, but on launching stap you get both of the following messages:

WARNING: Kernel function symbol table missing [man warning::symbols]
semantic error: process return probes not available [man error::inode-uprobes]

then SystemTap may have failed to verify support for this feature. You can fix this by following the steps in #System.map is missing.