'hist' triggers allow users to continually aggregate trace events,
which can then be viewed afterwards by simply reading a 'hist' file
containing the aggregation in a human-readable format.

The basic idea is very simple and boils down to a mechanism whereby
trace events, rather than being exhaustively dumped in raw form and
viewed directly, are automatically 'compressed' into meaningful tables
completely defined by the user.

This is done strictly via single-line command-line commands and
without the aid of any kind of programming language or interpreter.

A surprising number of typical use cases can be accomplished by users
via this simple mechanism.  In fact, a large number of the tasks that
users typically do using the more complicated script-based tracing
tools, at least during the initial stages of an investigation, can be
accomplished by simply specifying a set of keys and values to be used
in the creation of a hash table.

The Linux kernel trace event subsystem happens to provide an extensive
list of keys and values ready-made for such a purpose in the form of
the event format files associated with each trace event.  By simply
consulting the format file for field names of interest and by plugging
them into the hist trigger command, users can create an endless number
of useful aggregations to help with investigating various properties
of the system.  See Documentation/trace/events.txt for examples.

hist triggers are implemented on top of the existing event trigger
infrastructure, and as such are consistent with the existing triggers
from a user's perspective as well.

The basic syntax follows the existing trigger syntax.  Users start an
aggregation by writing a 'hist' trigger to the event of interest's
trigger file:

  # echo hist:keys=xxx [ if filter] > event/trigger

Once a hist trigger has been set up, by default it continually
aggregates every matching event into a hash table using the event key
and a value field named 'hitcount'.

To view the aggregation at any point in time, simply read the 'hist'
file in the same directory as the 'trigger' file:

  # cat event/hist

The detailed syntax provides additional options for user control, and
is described exhaustively in Documentation/trace/events.txt and in the
virtual tracing/README file in the tracing subsystem.

Link: http://lkml.kernel.org/r/72d263b5e1853fe9c314953b65833c3aa75479f2.1457029949.git.tom.zanussi@linux.intel.com



Signed-off-by: Tom Zanussi <tom.zanussi@linux.intel.com>
Tested-by: Masami Hiramatsu <masami.hiramatsu.pt@hitachi.com>
Reviewed-by: Namhyung Kim <namhyung@kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt <rostedt@goodmis.org>