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-rw-r--r--Documentation/trace/ftrace.txt83
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diff --git a/Documentation/trace/ftrace.txt b/Documentation/trace/ftrace.txt
index 6f51fed45f2..53d6a3c51d8 100644
--- a/Documentation/trace/ftrace.txt
+++ b/Documentation/trace/ftrace.txt
@@ -1842,6 +1842,89 @@ an error.
# cat buffer_size_kb
85
+Snapshot
+--------
+CONFIG_TRACER_SNAPSHOT makes a generic snapshot feature
+available to all non latency tracers. (Latency tracers which
+record max latency, such as "irqsoff" or "wakeup", can't use
+this feature, since those are already using the snapshot
+mechanism internally.)
+
+Snapshot preserves a current trace buffer at a particular point
+in time without stopping tracing. Ftrace swaps the current
+buffer with a spare buffer, and tracing continues in the new
+current (=previous spare) buffer.
+
+The following debugfs files in "tracing" are related to this
+feature:
+
+ snapshot:
+
+ This is used to take a snapshot and to read the output
+ of the snapshot. Echo 1 into this file to allocate a
+ spare buffer and to take a snapshot (swap), then read
+ the snapshot from this file in the same format as
+ "trace" (described above in the section "The File
+ System"). Both reads snapshot and tracing are executable
+ in parallel. When the spare buffer is allocated, echoing
+ 0 frees it, and echoing else (positive) values clear the
+ snapshot contents.
+ More details are shown in the table below.
+
+ status\input | 0 | 1 | else |
+ --------------+------------+------------+------------+
+ not allocated |(do nothing)| alloc+swap | EINVAL |
+ --------------+------------+------------+------------+
+ allocated | free | swap | clear |
+ --------------+------------+------------+------------+
+
+Here is an example of using the snapshot feature.
+
+ # echo 1 > events/sched/enable
+ # echo 1 > snapshot
+ # cat snapshot
+# tracer: nop
+#
+# entries-in-buffer/entries-written: 71/71 #P:8
+#
+# _-----=> irqs-off
+# / _----=> need-resched
+# | / _---=> hardirq/softirq
+# || / _--=> preempt-depth
+# ||| / delay
+# TASK-PID CPU# |||| TIMESTAMP FUNCTION
+# | | | |||| | |
+ <idle>-0 [005] d... 2440.603828: sched_switch: prev_comm=swapper/5 prev_pid=0 prev_prio=120 prev_state=R ==> next_comm=snapshot-test-2 next_pid=2242 next_prio=120
+ sleep-2242 [005] d... 2440.603846: sched_switch: prev_comm=snapshot-test-2 prev_pid=2242 prev_prio=120 prev_state=R ==> next_comm=kworker/5:1 next_pid=60 next_prio=120
+[...]
+ <idle>-0 [002] d... 2440.707230: sched_switch: prev_comm=swapper/2 prev_pid=0 prev_prio=120 prev_state=R ==> next_comm=snapshot-test-2 next_pid=2229 next_prio=120
+
+ # cat trace
+# tracer: nop
+#
+# entries-in-buffer/entries-written: 77/77 #P:8
+#
+# _-----=> irqs-off
+# / _----=> need-resched
+# | / _---=> hardirq/softirq
+# || / _--=> preempt-depth
+# ||| / delay
+# TASK-PID CPU# |||| TIMESTAMP FUNCTION
+# | | | |||| | |
+ <idle>-0 [007] d... 2440.707395: sched_switch: prev_comm=swapper/7 prev_pid=0 prev_prio=120 prev_state=R ==> next_comm=snapshot-test-2 next_pid=2243 next_prio=120
+ snapshot-test-2-2229 [002] d... 2440.707438: sched_switch: prev_comm=snapshot-test-2 prev_pid=2229 prev_prio=120 prev_state=S ==> next_comm=swapper/2 next_pid=0 next_prio=120
+[...]
+
+
+If you try to use this snapshot feature when current tracer is
+one of the latency tracers, you will get the following results.
+
+ # echo wakeup > current_tracer
+ # echo 1 > snapshot
+bash: echo: write error: Device or resource busy
+ # cat snapshot
+cat: snapshot: Device or resource busy
+
-----------
More details can be found in the source code, in the