Profiling Unification

The Profiling Framework has been modified to add profiling categories which group various profiling tools that overlap in functionality. There are three categories to start with: Timing, Memory, and Coverage and additional categories can be added in the future. Each category has a Profiling Launch short-cut whereby the user can kick off a profiling session via a single click. Each category has a default tool to use which includes default parameters. For example, a user could select to do a Profile Timing run and this will end up using whatever profiling timing tool is set up as default. The default can be changed via workspace preferences or over-ridden for a project via its properties. For more details, see the Profiling User's Guide.

GCov Launch Support

With the new Profiling Unification framework, profiling tools are categorized into one of the three default categories: Timing, Memory, and Coverage. GCov has been categorized into the Coverage category and as such can now be launched from the Profile Coverage launch short-cut. The launch short-cut will run the executable, gather the coverage data, and then open the GCov viewer. In the past, an end-user would have to run the executable manually and double-click on coverage data files created.

GProf Launch Support

Like GCov, GProf is part of the new Profiling Unification framework. GProf is categorized in the Timing category along with Perf, OProfile, and Callgraph. Also like GCov, it is now possible to launch GProf using the Profile Timing launch short-cut. In the past, users had to double-click on the gmon.out file for the project. The profiling launch short-cut will run the executable and will open the GProf view automatically for gmon.out, if created.

New Profiling Framework

OProfile has been added to the profiling tools in the new profiling unification framework. It has been added to the Profile Timing category along with Perf, GProf, and Callgraph. In addition to profiling an application via the direct OProfile launch short-cut, the Profile Timing short-cut can be used with OProfile being selected as the timing tool to use.

New Profiling Framework

Perf has been added to the profiling tools in the new profiling unification framework. It has been added to the Profile Timing category along with OProfile, GProf, and Callgraph. In addition to profiling an application via the direct Perf launch short-cut, the Profile Timing short-cut can be used with Perf being selected as the timing tool to use or simply by default since Perf is the Timing category default tool.

SystemTap Launch Configuration

Systemtap scripts can now be run through the context menu by right-clicking on the in the editor or on the file in the project explorer and selecting 'Run As' -> 'Systemtap Script'. Alternatively you can select 'Run As' -> 'Run Configurations...'. This will bring up the Run Configurations dialog which now has an entry for SystemTap. The screen shot below shows the details of that dialog.

Miscellaneous Improvements

The way probe points are collected from installed SystemTap application was improved making it faster and less error prone. In addition there were numerous bug fixes and stability improvements.

New Profiling Framework

The set of Valgrind tools has been added to the new profiling unification fframework under the Memory category. The list of tools includes Cachegrind, Memcheck, Helgrind, and Massif. There already exists a direct profiling launch short-cut for Valgrind, but this defaults to use Memcheck unless the end-user modifies the Profiling Configuration to set the tool otherwise. With the new framework, the user can choose the Valgrind tool ahead of time and invoke the Profile Memory launch short-cut directly without having to perform the extra step of modification.