Devices                                               profile(7D)



NAME
     profile - DTrace profile interrupt provider

DESCRIPTION
     The profile driver is a DTrace dynamic tracing provider that
     adds  time-based interrupt event sources that can be used as
     DTrace probes.


     Each profile event source is a time-based  interrupt  firing
     every  fixed,  specified  time  interval.  You can use these
     probes to sample some aspect of system state every unit time
     and  the  samples can then be used to infer system behavior.
     If the sampling rate is high, or the sampling time is  long,
     an  accurate  inference  is  possible.  By  using the DTrace
     facility to bind arbitrary actions to probes,  you  can  use
     the  profile  provider to sample practically anything in the
     system. For example, you  could  sample  the  state  of  the
     current  thread,  the  CPU  state,  or  the  current machine
     instruction each time a probe fires.


     The profile driver is not a public interface and you  access
     the instrumentation offered by this provider through DTrace.
     Refer to the Solaris Dynamic Tracing Guide for a description
     of the public documented interfaces available for the DTrace
     facility and the probes offered by the profile provider.

ATRIBUTES
     See attributes(5) for a description of the following  attri-
     butes:



     
           ATRIBUTE TYPE               ATRIBUTE VALUE       
    
     Availability                 SUNWdtrp                    
    
     Interface Stability          Private                     
    


SEE ALSO
     dtrace(1M), attributes(5), dtrace(7D)


     Solaris Dynamic Tracing Guide







SunOS 5.11           Last change: 4 Sep 2003                    1