valgrind/lackey/docs/lk-manual.xml

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<chapter id="lk-manual" xreflabel="Lackey">

<title>Lackey: an example tool</title>

<para>To use this tool, you must specify
<option>--tool=lackey</option> on the Valgrind
command line.</para>


<sect1 id="lk-manual.overview" xreflabel="Overview">
<title>Overview</title>

<para>Lackey is a simple Valgrind tool that does various kinds of basic
program measurement.  It adds quite a lot of simple instrumentation to the
program's code.  It is primarily intended to be of use as an example tool,
and consequently emphasises clarity of implementation over
performance.</para>

</sect1>


<sect1 id="lk-manual.options" xreflabel="Lackey Command-line Options">
<title>Lackey Command-line Options</title>

<para>Lackey-specific command-line options are:</para>

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<variablelist id="lk.opts.list">

  <varlistentry id="opt.basic-counts" xreflabel="--basic-counts">
    <term>
      <option><![CDATA[--basic-counts=<no|yes> [default: yes] ]]></option>
    </term>
    <listitem>
      <para>When enabled, Lackey prints the following statistics and
      information about the execution of the client program:</para>

      <orderedlist>

       <listitem>
        <para>The number of calls to the function specified by the
        <option>--fnname</option> option (the default is
        <computeroutput>main</computeroutput>).
        If the program has had its symbols stripped, the count will always
        be zero.</para>
       </listitem>

       <listitem>
        <para>The number of conditional branches encountered and the
        number and proportion of those taken.</para>
       </listitem>

       <listitem>
        <para>The number of superblocks entered and completed by the
        program.  Note that due to optimisations done by the JIT, this
        is not at all an accurate value.</para>
       </listitem>

       <listitem>
        <para>The number of guest (x86, amd64, ppc, etc.) instructions and IR
        statements executed.  IR is Valgrind's RISC-like intermediate
        representation via which all instrumentation is done.
        </para>
       </listitem>

       <listitem>
        <para>Ratios between some of these counts.</para>
       </listitem>

       <listitem>
        <para>The exit code of the client program.</para>
       </listitem>

      </orderedlist>

    </listitem>
  </varlistentry>

  <varlistentry id="opt.detailed-counts" xreflabel="--detailed-counts">
    <term>
      <option><![CDATA[--detailed-counts=<no|yes> [default: no] ]]></option>
    </term>
    <listitem>
      <para>When enabled, Lackey prints a table containing counts of loads,
      stores and ALU operations, differentiated by their IR types.
      The IR types are identified by their IR name ("I1", "I8", ... "I128",
      "F32", "F64", and "V128").</para>
    </listitem>
  </varlistentry>

  <varlistentry id="opt.trace-mem" xreflabel="--trace-mem">
    <term>
      <option><![CDATA[--trace-mem=<no|yes> [default: no] ]]></option>
    </term>
    <listitem>
      <para>When enabled, Lackey prints the size and address of almost every
      memory access made by the program.  See the comments at the top of
      the file <computeroutput>lackey/lk_main.c</computeroutput> for details
      about the output format, how it works, and inaccuracies in the address
      trace.  Note that this option produces immense amounts of output.</para>
    </listitem>
  </varlistentry>

  <varlistentry id="opt.trace-superblocks" xreflabel="--trace-superblocks">
    <term>
      <option><![CDATA[--trace-superblocks=<no|yes> [default: no] ]]></option>
    </term>
    <listitem>
      <para>When enabled, 
      Lackey prints out the address of every superblock 
      (a single entry, multiple exit, linear chunk of code) executed by the
      program.  This is primarily of interest to Valgrind developers.  See
      the comments at the top of the file
      <computeroutput>lackey/lk_main.c</computeroutput> for details about
      the output format.  Note that this option produces large amounts of
      output.</para>
    </listitem>
  </varlistentry>

  <varlistentry id="opt.fnname" xreflabel="--fnname">
    <term>
      <option><![CDATA[--fnname=<name> [default: main] ]]></option>
    </term>
    <listitem>
      <para>Changes the function for which calls are counted when
      <option>--basic-counts=yes</option> is specified.</para>
    </listitem>
  </varlistentry>

</variablelist>
<!-- end of xi:include in the manpage -->

</sect1>

</chapter>