LTTNG-ENABLE-CHANN(1)

NAME
lttng-enable-channel - Create or enable LTTng channels

SYNOPSIS

Create a Linux kernel channel:

lttng [GENERAL OPTIONS] enable-channel --kernel
      [--discard | --overwrite] [--output=(mmap | splice)]
      [--subbuf-size=SIZE] [--num-subbuf=COUNT]
      [--switch-timer=PERIODUS] [--read-timer=PERIODUS]
      [--monitor-timer=PERIODUS] [--buffers-global]
      [--tracefile-size=SIZE [--tracefile-count=COUNT]]
      [--session=SESSION] CHANNEL

Create a user space channel:

lttng [GENERAL OPTIONS] enable-channel --userspace
      [--overwrite | [--discard] --blocking-timeout=TIMEOUTUS]
      [--output=mmap] [--buffers-uid | --buffers-pid]
      [--subbuf-size=SIZE] [--num-subbuf=COUNT]
      [--switch-timer=PERIODUS] [--read-timer=PERIODUS]
      [--monitor-timer=PERIODUS]
      [--tracefile-size=SIZE [--tracefile-count=COUNT]]
      [--session=SESSION] CHANNEL

Enable channel(s):

lttng [GENERAL OPTIONS] enable-channel (--userspace | --kernel)
      [--session=SESSION] CHANNEL[,CHANNEL]...

DESCRIPTION

The lttng enable-channel command does one of:

    • Create a channel named CHANNEL.

    • Enable one or more disabled channels named CHANNEL (non-option argument, comma-separated).

See lttng-concepts(7) to learn more about channels.

The channel(s) to create or enable belong to:

With the --session=SESSION option
    The recording session named SESSION.

Without the --session option
    The current recording session (see lttng-concepts(7) to learn more about the current recording session).

Note

    The lttng-enable-event(1) command can automatically create a default channel when no channel exists for the provided tracing domain.

See the “EXAMPLES” section below for usage examples.

List the channels of a given recording session with the lttng-list(1) and lttng-status(1) commands.

Disable an enabled channel with the lttng-disable-channel(1) command.

Important

    As of LTTng 2.13.14, you may NOT perform the following operations with the enable-channel command:

        • Change an attribute of an existing channel.

        • Enable a disabled channel once its recording session has been active (started; see lttng-start(1)) at least once.

        • Create a channel once its recording session has been active at least once.

        • Create a user space channel with a given buffering scheme (--buffers-uid or --buffers-pid options) and create a second user space channel with a different buffering scheme in the same recording session.

OPTIONS

See lttng(1) for GENERAL OPTIONS.

  Tracing domain

One of:

-k, --kernel
    Create or enable channels in the Linux kernel domain.

-u, --userspace
    Create or enable channels in the user space domain.

  Recording target

-s SESSION, --session=SESSION
    Create or enable channels in the recording session named SESSION instead of the current recording session.

  Buffering scheme

One of:

--buffers-global
    Allocate a single set of ring buffers for the whole system.

    Only available with the --kernel option.

    As of LTTng 2.13.14, this is the default buffering scheme for the Linux kernel tracing domain, but this may change in the future.

--buffers-pid
    Allocate one set of ring buffers (one per CPU) for each instrumented process of:

    If you connect to the root session daemon
        All Unix users.

        See the “Session daemon connection” section of lttng(1) to learn how a user application connects to a session daemon.

    Otherwise
        Your Unix user.

    Only available with the --userspace option.

--buffers-uid
    Allocate one set of ring buffers (one per CPU) shared by all the instrumented processes of:

    If you connect to the root session daemon
        Each Unix user.

        See the “Session daemon connection” section of lttng(1) to learn how a user application connects to a session daemon.

    Otherwise
        Your Unix user.

    Only available with the --userspace option.

    As of LTTng 2.13.14, this is the default buffering scheme for the user space tracing domain, but this may change in the future.

  Event record loss mode

--blocking-timeout=TIMEOUTUS
    Set the channel’s blocking timeout value to TIMEOUTUS µs for instrumented applications executed with a set LTTNG_UST_ALLOW_BLOCKING environment variable.

    TIMEOUTUS is one of:

    0 (default)
        Do not block (non-blocking mode).

    inf
        Block forever until a sub-buffer is available to write the event record.

    N, a positive value
        Wait for at most N µs when trying to write to a sub-buffer. After N µs, discard the event record.

    This option is only available with both the --userspace and --discard options.

One of:

--discard
    Discard event records when there’s no available sub-buffer.

    As of LTTng 2.13.14, this is the default event record loss mode, but this may change in the future.

--overwrite
    Overwrite the whole sub-buffer containing the oldest event records when there’s no available sub-buffer (flight recorder mode).

  Sub-buffers

--num-subbuf=COUNT
    Use COUNT sub-buffers per ring buffer.

    The effective value is COUNT rounded up to the next power of two.

    Default values:

    --userspace and --buffers-uid options
        4

    --userspace and --buffers-pid options
        4

    --kernel and --buffers-global options
        4

    metadata channel
        2

--output=TYPE
    Set channel’s output type to TYPE.

    TYPE is one of:

    mmap
        Share ring buffers between the tracer and the consumer daemon with the mmap(2) system call.

    splice
        Share ring buffers between the tracer and the consumer daemon with the splice(2) system call.

        Only available with the --kernel option.

    Default values:

    --userspace and --buffers-uid options
        mmap

    --userspace and --buffers-pid options
        mmap

    --kernel and --buffers-global options
        splice

    metadata channel
        mmap

--subbuf-size=SIZE
    Set the size of each sub-buffer to SIZE bytes.

    The effective value is SIZE rounded up to the next power of two.

    The k (KiB), M (MiB), and G (GiB) suffixes are supported.

    The minimum sub-buffer size, for each tracer, is the maximum value between the default below and the system page size (see getconf(1) with the PAGE_SIZE variable).

    Default values:

    --userspace and --buffers-uid options
        524288

    --userspace and --buffers-pid options
        16384

    --kernel and --buffers-global options
        1048576

    metadata channel
        4096

  Trace files

--tracefile-count=COUNT
    Limit the number of trace files which LTTng writes for this channel to COUNT.

    COUNT set to 0 means “unlimited”.

    Default: 0.

    You must also use the --tracefile-size option with this option.

--tracefile-size=SIZE
    Set the maximum size of each trace file which LTTng writes for this channel to SIZE bytes.

    SIZE set to 0 means “unlimited”.

    Default: 0.

    Note
        Data streams which LTTng writes for a channel configured with this option may inaccurately report discarded event records as of CTF 1.8.

  Timers

--monitor-timer=PERIODUS
    Set the period of the monitor timer of the channel to PERIODUS µs.

    Set PERIODUS to 0 to disable the monitor timer.

    Default values:

    --userspace and --buffers-uid options
        1000000

    --userspace and --buffers-pid options
        1000000

    --kernel and --buffers-global options
        1000000

--read-timer=PERIODUS
    Set the period of the read timer of the channel to PERIODUS µs.

    Set PERIODUS to 0 to disable the read timer.

    Default values:

    --userspace and --buffers-uid options
        0

    --userspace and --buffers-pid options
        0

    --kernel and --buffers-global options
        200000

    metadata channel
        0

--switch-timer=PERIODUS
    Set the period of the switch timer of the channel to PERIODUS µs.

    Set PERIODUS to 0 to disable the switch timer.

    Default values:

    --userspace and --buffers-uid options
        0

    --userspace and --buffers-pid options
        0

    --kernel and --buffers-global options
        0

    metadata channel
        0

  Program information

-h, --help
    Show help.

    This option attempts to launch /usr/bin/man to view this manual page. Override the manual pager path with the LTTNG_MAN_BIN_PATH environment variable.

--list-options
    List available command options and quit.

EXIT STATUS

0
    Success

1
    Command error

2
    Undefined command

3
    Fatal error

4
    Command warning (something went wrong during the command)

ENVIRONMENT

LTTNG_ABORT_ON_ERROR
    Set to 1 to abort the process after the first error is encountered.

LTTNG_HOME
    Path to the LTTng home directory.

    Defaults to $HOME.

    Useful when the Unix user running the commands has a non-writable home directory.

LTTNG_MAN_BIN_PATH
    Absolute path to the manual pager to use to read the LTTng command-line help (with lttng-help(1) or with the --help option) instead of /usr/bin/man.

LTTNG_SESSION_CONFIG_XSD_PATH
    Path to the directory containing the session.xsd recording session configuration XML schema.

LTTNG_SESSIOND_PATH
    Absolute path to the LTTng session daemon binary (see lttng-sessiond(8)) to spawn from the lttng-create(1) command.

    The --sessiond-path general option overrides this environment variable.

FILES

$LTTNG_HOME/.lttngrc
    Unix user’s LTTng runtime configuration.

    This is where LTTng stores the name of the Unix user’s current recording session between executions of lttng(1). lttng-create(1) and lttng-set-session(1) set the current recording session.

$LTTNG_HOME/lttng-traces
    Default output directory of LTTng traces in local and snapshot modes.

    Override this path with the --output option of the lttng-create(1) command.

$LTTNG_HOME/.lttng
    Unix user’s LTTng runtime and configuration directory.

$LTTNG_HOME/.lttng/sessions
    Default directory containing the Unix user’s saved recording session configurations (see lttng-save(1) and lttng-load(1)).

/etc/lttng/sessions
    Directory containing the system-wide saved recording session configurations (see lttng-save(1) and lttng-load(1)).

Note

    $LTTNG_HOME defaults to the value of the HOME environment variable.

EXAMPLES

Example 1. Create a Linux kernel channel with default attributes in the current recording session.

    The following command line only creates a new channel if my-channel doesn’t name an existing Linux kernel channel in the current recording session.

        $ lttng enable-channel --kernel my-channel

Example 2. Create a user space channel with a per-process buffering scheme in a specific recording session.

    See the --session and --buffers-pid options.

        $ lttng enable-channel --session=my-session --userspace \
                               --buffers-pid my-channel

Example 3. Create a Linux kernel channel in the current recording session with four 32-MiB sub-buffers per ring buffer.

    See the --num-subbuf and --subbuf-size options.

        $ lttng enable-channel --kernel my-channel \
                               --num-subbuf=4 --subbuf-size=32M

Example 4. Create a user space channel in the current recording session with trace file rotation.

    See the --tracefile-count and --tracefile-size options.

        $ lttng enable-channel --userspace my-channel \
                               --tracefile-count=16 --tracefile-size=8M

Example 5. Enable two user space channels of a specific recording session.

        $ lttng enable-channel --session=my-session --userspace \
                               canal-d,rds

RESOURCES

    • LTTng project website <https://lttng.org>

    • LTTng documentation <https://lttng.org/docs>

    • LTTng bug tracker <https://bugs.lttng.org>

    • Git repositories <https://git.lttng.org>

    • GitHub organization <https://github.com/lttng>

    • Continuous integration <https://ci.lttng.org/>

    • Mailing list <https://lists.lttng.org/> for support and development: lttng-dev@lists.lttng.org

    • IRC channel <irc://irc.oftc.net/lttng>: #lttng on irc.oftc.net

COPYRIGHT

This program is part of the LTTng-tools project.

LTTng-tools is distributed under the GNU General Public License version 2 <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.en.html>. See the LICENSE <https://github.com/lttng/lttng-tools/blob/master/LICENSE> file for details.

THANKS

Special thanks to Michel Dagenais and the DORSAL laboratory <http://www.dorsal.polymtl.ca/> at École Polytechnique de Montréal for the LTTng journey.

Also thanks to the Ericsson teams working on tracing which helped us greatly with detailed bug reports and unusual test cases.

SEE ALSO

lttng(1), lttng-disable-channel(1), lttng-list(1), lttng-concepts(7)