Overview
This tutorial describes how to get started using the Ignition Common profiler to measure and visualize run-time performance of your software.
The ignition::common::Profiler
provides a common interface that can allow for multiple underlying profiler implementations. Currently, the only available implementation is Remotery.
The goal of the profiler is to provide introspection and analysis when enabled at compile time, but to introduce no overhead when it is disabled at compile-time.
To control if the profiler is enabled, set the IGN_PROFILER_ENABLE
flag using cmake on the targets or sources that you are interested in (described below).
Enabling the Profiler
In order to use the profiler, inspection points must be added to the source code, and the application or library must be linked to the ignition-common::profiler
component.
To start, download the profiler.cc example.
The relevant corresponding C++ would be as follows:
Update your CMakeLists.txt to the following. Note that the profiler must be enabled at compile time in order to function.
Run cmake
and build the example
Then execute the example and the profiler visualization:
From terminal 1:
From terminal 2, open the visualizer using one of the following commands
If you are successful, you should see the profiler output in a browser.
Using the Profiler
The profiler is used through a series of macros.
The two primary ways of profiling a section of code are to either use a matched pair of IGN_PROFILE_BEGIN
and IGN_PROFILE_END
macros, or to use a single RAII-style macro IGN_PROFILE
. The RAII style will stop measuring once the scope that the macro was invoked in is left.
Using begin/end:
Using RAII-style:
Additionally, each thread can be given a name for easy reference in the UI:
Configuring the Profiler
Specific profiler implementations may have further configuration options available.
Configuring Remotery
Remotery can additionally be configured via environment variables. Most users should not need to change these for their applications.
RMT_PORT
: Port to listen for incoming connections on.RMT_QUEUE_SIZE
: Size of the internal message queuesRMT_MSGS_PER_UPDATE
: Upper limit on messages consumed per loopRMT_SLEEP_BETWEEN_UPDATES
: Controls profile server update rate.
These directly set the corresponding parameters in the rmtSettings
structure. For more information, consult the Remotery source