Solaris™ Dynamic Tracing Increasing Performance Through Complete Software Observability < Introducing Solaris™ Dynamic Tracing (DTrace) With the Solaris™ 10 Operating System (OS), Sun introduces Dynamic Tracing (DTrace): a dynamic tracing framework for troubleshooting systemic problems in real time on production systems. DTrace is designed to quickly identify the root cause of system performance problems. DTrace safely and dynamically instruments the running operating system kernel and running applications without rebooting the kernel and recompiling — or even restarting — appli- cations. And, when not explicitly enabled, DTrace has zero effect on the system. It is available on all supported Solaris OS platforms. Designed for use on production systems Provides single view of software stack DTrace is absolutely safe for use on production With DTrace, system administrators, integrators, systems. It has little impact when running, and developers can really see what the system and no impact on the system when not in use. is doing, as well as how the kernel and appli- Highlights Unlike other tools, it can be initiated dynami- cations interact with each other. It enables cally without rebooting the system, using users to formulate arbitrary questions and get • Designed for use on production special modes, restarting applications, or any concise answers, allowing them to find per- systems to find performance other changes to the kernel or applications. formance bottlenecks on development, pilot, bottlenecks and production systems. More generally, DTrace • Provides a single view of the DTrace provides accurate and concise informa- can be used to troubleshoot virtually any software stack — from kernel tion in real time. Questions are answered systemic problem — often finding problems to application, leading to rapid identification of performance immediately, eliminating the need to collect that have been plaguing a system for years. bottlenecks large amounts of data for later analysis. DTrace • Dynamically instruments the can also highlight patterns and trends. This Jarod Jenson of Aeysis, Inc. has has been using kernel and instructions in any makes it easier and faster to identify bottle- DTrace since March, 2003 to find previously application with a near-infinite necks, a task that can be difficult and time- undiagnosable system performance problems. number of probe points, improving consuming with many other tools. By employing “DTrace changes my methodologies and the ability to service software speculative tracing, DTrace can record and way I approach issues now. Time previously • Enables maximum resource report (or discard) trace data based on nonsi- wasted creating custom code for instrumen- utilization and application per- multaneous events, enabling quick identifica- tation is now dedicated to creating novel formance, as well as precise tion of transient problems and reducing the hypotheses to explain abberant behavior,” quantification of resource requirements need for post processing. In addition, DTrace says Jenson. “It’s what I call a quality-of-life can be used across Solaris Containers to feature, because root-causing these problems • Fast and easy to use, even on quickly correlate events and find bottlenecks used to be a very painful process that could complex systems with multiple layers of software on distributed applications such as Web appli- take weeks.” cations. All of this leads to increased perform- ance and service availability, while system downtime is reduced. 2 Data Sheet Solaris Dynamic Tracing sun.com/software Dynamically instruments any application By using DTrace, Jenson routinely provides his DTrace finds problems that simply could not be financial customers with triple-digit performance Learn More found before, regardless of how many days, increases, far above what is typically achieved Get the inside story on the trends weeks, or months of troubleshooting took place. through hardware upgrades. Customers can now and technologies shaping the future of “I can’t tell you how many times we find a support more transactions on their existing computing by signing up for the Sun problem using DTrace where someone asks how systems. He explains, “Many customers I have Inner Circle program. You’ll receive a we did it before, and the answer is, we couldn’t,” worked with had long-standing questions about monthly newsletter packed with informa- says Jenson. DTrace can instrument any applica- their application and its demands on the OS tion, plus access to a wealth of resources. tion without modifying or restarting. It runs that, due to failings of previously available tools, Register today at sun.com/joinic. only the traces that are requested, analyzes had gone unanswered. DTrace allows us to the data, and delivers fast, accurate answers. answer those questions in minutes and make Designed for system administrators and appli- decisions based on real data.” Finally, because cation developers, DTrace is easy to learn and it is now possible to see exactly what the system easy to use, providing a C-like scripting language is doing, companies can more accurately plan to save, share, and rerun tracing routines. for future capacity. Conclusion DTrace provides every developer and customer Enables maximum resource utilization and Fast, accurate, and easy to use running the Solaris 10 OS with an extremely application performance For the user, DTrace not only means higher powerful tool to analyze performance. It Now that users have the ability to understand utilization of assets, it also means empower- empowers them with advanced observability performance problems on production systems, ment when dealing with technology vendors. into the systems they own to see how they companies no longer need to spend time and No longer do users need to take a vendor's word work. With DTrace, the bottom line is developing money trying to replicate the problems on for the causes of systemic problems. By using higher quality applications, lowering costs, separate test systems. With DTrace, customers DTrace, they can discover for themselves the reducing downtime, and providing greater can tune their systems for better performance, nature of problems, gathering data that can utilization of existing resources to improve ROI. better utilization, and achieving greater returns end finger-pointing among vendors, which on investment (ROI). often plagues high-priority problems. The upshot for the user is higher quality applications For example, one of Sun's own Sun Ray™ ultra- and better system performance. And the upshot thin client servers was underperforming. A team for vendors is less time spent resolving problems. of experts looked into the problem for several With DTrace, everyone wins. weeks, to no avail. After upgrading the system to the Solaris 10 OS with DTrace, it took just 20 minutes of analysis to find a rogue application. The system now supports 30 percent more desktops. 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